Mark of the Magi
by Lily of Trust
Summary: (AU) In the Kingdom of Taidem, those with Elemental powers are property, valued only for their ability to keep the sovreign alive. Shin Mouri, latest in a line of Water Elementals, has no intention of dying. But he'll need help to make it to safety...
1.

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Mark of the Magi

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimers: I have no ownership whatsoever of the characters you recognize. But the ones you don't (not that there'll be any...) are aaaaall mine! P Nyah! I don't have a job aside from babysitting, so suing is sort of pointless...

Midafternoon sunlight bore mercilessly down on the docks of Kichis, scrambling the brains of anyone dense enough to stick their heads out of doors. Those who worked the docks, loading and unloading the great freight ships traversing the Straight of Eon, were no exceptions. Only they had no choice _but_ to be there. Summertime was the busiest season for trade in the Kingdom of Taidem, and Kichis, the jewel in the crown, the Capitol, refused to miss out on its cut of the profits.

The only relief to be found during those long, hot summer days was in the lunch break all dockworkers were now entitled to. Up until a few years back, they hadn't even had _those_ rights. Then the Dockers' Union had gone on strike and demanded a pay raise, shorter working hours, and a lunch break. Things had improved marginally since then.

Or at least, that was what everyone said. Shin Mouri didn't really notice much of a difference.

He took his break among a large stack of frigate crates. Mostly because he was the only one small and/or nimble enough to wedge himself between the crates, or clamber to the top. He didn't necessarily enjoy it much, but it was better than being shoved around and roughed up for what little he had in the way of food.

Shin took a bite from the pear in his hand and tried not to make a face at the too-ripe mushiness of the texture. He'd been lucky to get fruit at all, despite Kichis being located in a tropical zone. Dockers' wages were still a pittance. 

He chewed slowly, trying to make his lunch last. Sixteen years of inferior food had done something to stunt his growth. He was small for his age, with a build that was wiry and lean rather than muscular. Just looking at him no one would have figured he'd been doing dock-duty for close to five years. Constant exposure to the sun had browned his skin to a permanent tan, and lightened normally auburn hair to brown. Eyes a darker green-blue than the churning sea swept lazily over the docks below as he caught dripping pear juice from falling to his bare chest. There wasn't much point in wearing a shirt in weather like this. He licked at his fingers, lost in his own thoughts as the daily work of the docks roared around him.

"Oiy! I've been looking for you!" A voice bellowed from below. Shin set the rest of his lunch (consisting of a heel of bread and a clay jug of water) aside. He leaned out over the edge of the crate he'd been sitting on and chuckled.

"Me?"

"No, the other skinny-assed dockrunner," The man on the ground snorted. He yelped in surprise as the pear core splattered onto the wooden boards at his feet.

"Kraken take you Shu," Shin snickered as he clambered easily down the frigate crates. "I was trying to eat. What d'you want with me?"

"We just got a galleon in from the East, "Shu said "And since we're paid for how much junk we shift, I thought might want in on it," He flicked a glob of pear-meat from his shoulder and glared mildly at the other young man. "This is what I get for being nice."

Shin coughed sheepishly, feeling very much the child for chucking his lunch. He knew the time the other docker took to come and fetch him cut into his own profits. He tossed the bread to his friend in a combination thanks and peace offering. Shu caught it easily with one hand and grinned as he bit into it. Truce accepted, slight forgotten.

They wove their way through the busy traffic of other dockers, carters, sailors and fishermen. All of them were men (and very few women) conditioned for hard work and long days. There was one truth that bound them all together: The sea is life. There wasn't a man at the dockside whose livelihood didn't depend on the wide ocean.

A carter had decided to take a right turn directly into an oncoming fisherman hauling the morning's catch. Both had gone down in a spill of flopping, half-dead sea-life. The cursed and swore and pounded on one another with meaty fists. Shin and Shu edged around the commotion as only those used to life on the piers could. They bantered easily back and forth as they went, ignoring the heady fishy smell.

Shu paused at the beginning of the pier where the galleon was docked. The heat was definitely getting to him. Having a heavyset frame came in handy for hauling large loads, but it made him all the more susceptible to heat. Having dark hair didn't help either. He'd learned early on in his career not to bother with anymore clothing than was strictly necessary. None of the dockers did. It only increased the risk of heat stroke. Some even got away with running around in a breechcloth and little else. He wiped sweat from his brow and noticed Shin was waiting for him. That was usually a tacit invitation to work together and split the resulting pay. Shu grinned and nodded; they'd done well by each other before.

A swarthy man with a megaphone in one hand stood atop a pier pilling, shouting instructions at the top of his lungs. Neither Shin nor Shu knew this particular dock-master, but all signed seemed to say working under him would be trying.

They checked in with him, gave their names to a small, flighty man with a nervous tick in his cheek, and went to work. The mindless drudgery of working the pulleys, maneuvering heavy crates onto handcarts, and unloading smaller packages to be shipped further on quickly erased any thoughts not concerning the task at hand. The jumpy little man flittered everywhere, noting down on a makeshift clipboard who had unloaded what, and which items went where.

Shu heaved yet another wooden box down onto the pier and moved back to bring another down to the ramp. He left the unpacking and running to Shin. The young man deftly pried the lid off the crate, shoved the crowbar back into his belt, and quickly emptied the contents. None of the other workers were half so quick when it came to squirming through the crowds to the waiting carters. That was why they made such an effective team; Shu had strength enough to unload dozens of crates, and Shin had the speed to get them unpacked.

He had just finished with a shipment of spices all carefully bottled and labeled. The carter took off at a speed precisely calculated to get to his destination as quickly as possible without damaging the cargo. Shin turned back around to see to the next one, when he stopped and looked about himself with a frown. After spending practically his whole life on the piers, he could tell when something was out of place. There was a strange noise nearby, barely audible over all the commotion in the background. The sound of a rope creaking under immense pressure, he thought. Instinct brought his gaze to rest on a large crate suspended by a rope-and-pulley set up over the dock. Beneath it, several other crates had been stacked, only half unloaded. Shin could just see the rope snapping, the crate falling, and the utter destruction of the goods beneath it.

All of which would come out of the dockers' combined wages

Shin shoved through the crowd, ignoring the snaps of annoyance. He watched as the rope frayed and began to untwist near the metal staple it had been secured to. It ripped loose just as he reached out to secure it. The rope twisted away and tore through the air with a sinister 'zzzzzt' noise.

Shin yelped and dove for it, reaching desperately. The madly lashing end curled once around his wrist. It snapped taught suddenly as he got his feet back beneath himself and braced his body backward against the pull.

The crate swung crazily from side to side as its fall was abruptly halted. Shin grunted in pain as the force practically ripped his arms from their sockets. Joints popped as he tried to strain back. Other men rushed crazily back and forth beneath the dangling creel, removing as many goods as they possibly could. Blood ran down his arm and dripped into his face as the rope bit cruelly into his wrist. Shin barely managed to raise his other hand to grab the cord. He could feel his feet beginning to leave the ground, and had a sudden horrible mental image of himself being pulled along by the weight of the load, and dragged right through the pulley.

A heavily muscled arm clamped around his waist, squooshing the wind right out of him. Another arm reached up to take hold of the taut rope.

"Heavy...isn't it?" Shu's gruff voice panted into his ear. The muscle and sinew in his arms corded and stood out in sharp relief against his skin as he slowly managed to pull the line back. Farther on up, the rigging began to fray against the pulley. Both young men could only watch as it shuddered and jerked. The rope slid between their hands, taking the skin off their palms and running slick with blood. Shin cried out in pain as he finally lost his grip, and the crate plummeted to the dock below. It smashed right through the wooden boarding and went on to sink into the depths of the bay. Fortunately nearly all of the boxes below had been cleared away, and no one had been stupid enough to dart back beneath the fall zone.

Shu and Shin crashed back to the ground and stayed there in a heap, slightly dazed by the impact.

Shin curled up on his side and hugged his lacerated arms to his chest, teeth gritted against the pain. Shu ignored the burning sensation in his palms and pushed himself back into a sitting position. He took in the huge, gaping hole; loose boards hanging off its edges like teeth attached only by a thread, and shook his head. That was going to take some serious gold to patch up.

"You two!" A megaphone-enhanced voice basted into their ears. Both young men jumped in spite of themselves, and leaned away from the dock-master. He took notice of this and lowered the phone. He offered them a half smile. "Good work. Take a quick break and get those sores seen to. We wouldn't want infection to set in." He bustled off to the piles of salvaged goods and began to sift through them with the assistance of the board-toting man.

Shu looked over at Shin and grinned ruefully. "Y'know, somehow I really don't think he's too concerned for our health."

Shin managed a chuckle and pushed himself to his feet. He was shaking in every limb from expended adrenaline, and forced himself to breathe evenly. "We're only as valuable as the work we put in." He stared down at the lurid rope burns that marked up his arms, and winced to himself. "We'd better wash these off and bind them up though. With the junk we handle, it could get nasty quick."

Shu pulled a face. "Gangrene. Great."

Plenty of people pulled back to give them room to leave. Most of the other dockers had seen their sudden spurt of heroics, and a few even offered a spattering of applause.

Back towards where the harbor met the city, the two men found a quiet spot near one of the communal pumps. This time of day, most people who could afford to do so were inside napping away the summer heat. Kichis would truly come alive after evening fell. Shut applied his strength to the rusty pump, which squeaked and groaned in protest, but spat out a sudden rush of clear water. This close to the docks, the water was still salty. Salt water was often used in cooking and cleaning. If you wanted fresh water, you had to go further into the city where the wells reached underground streams.

Shin hurried off to a nearby peddler's stall and picked up a few strips of something to wrap the raw marks with. Shu hissed to himself as he dunked his scored hands into the pail of saline. The salt might help wounds to heal, but it stung like fury. Shin dropped to his knees next to him and gestured for him to extend his hands. Shu sat quietly as the smaller teen bandaged up his hands. He flexed them experimentally, and raised an eyebrow at the near-professional quality of the binding. Shin just shrugged and dunked his own arms into the bucket. The water didn't seem to bother him at all. He scooped up handfuls of it and allowed the saltwater to dribble down his arms. The liquid in the pail slowly took on a pinkish tinge.

Shu left him to it and stood to stretch. There were horrible kinks in his shoulders and back from where he'd been stooping to heave crates for hours on end. He figured that even with the reduction for construction costs, he'd still netted a pretty fair amount that afternoon. He could get the rent paid up for the rest of the week and still have enough left to put by.

"Think you could hold a pint or two, shrimp?" He looked back over his shoulder at Shin, who shot him a dirty look. There were only three years between their ages. He didn't have to rub in the brown-haired teen's lack of height. 

"I hope you're joking," He said flatly, shaking water from his hands. "I could drink you under the table!"

The bigger man chuckled. "I'd like to see tha-" He stopped mid-sentence and stepped forward to grab one of Shin's wrists in his hand. The bone structure seemed almost ridiculously delicate against his callused fingers. Shu turned the hand over and was amazed to find no mark whatsoever. His eyes traveled up Shin's forearm, and still saw nothing. No rope burn, no scab, not even a scar!

Mouri yanked his hand away and took a few hesitant steps backwards. His eyes were wide and dilated, and there was something in his posture that resembled a cornered animal. He looked very much as though he wanted to bolt for cover. Shu's eyes fell to the pail of water, and understanding lit up his eyes like the sun in the east.

"You're an Elemental, aren't you?" He asked quietly, though there really wasn't much of a question in his tone. Shin swallowed hard and opened his mouth to deny it, but couldn't seem to find the words.

"Shu...you can't...I mean...don't...It's just hereditary..." He seemed to be on the verge of panic now. 

"You think I'd turn you in?" A thick blue-black eyebrow disappeared behind his bangs. 

"The reward money is an awful lot," Shin said weakly, though his voice seemed somewhat hoarse, even to his own ears.

"Not enough to condemn a man to die!" Shu growled.

"...You could get into trouble for this," No lie. There was always a demand for elementals in Kichis. And the reasoning behind it was both twisted and murky.

Up until twelve years prior, a single Family had reigned as the Rulers of Taidem. It had always been a wise and just sort of ruling Family, or at least the History books said as much. 

But then the Family's head Magi had gone rouge. He rampaged throughout the palace, destroying all with even so much as a trace of the Family's blood. Until at last there remained only the youngest son, recently returning from hammering out trade deals with a small city-state. The son was also a Magi, though only a minor one. He had managed to deflect the rouge's attacks, but could not go on the offensive. The rouge, realizing that the son's shields were far too advanced, put all his energy into a single casting, and spun a spell on him that slowly drained him of his life essence. The shields were of no use, and the young man fell.

For some reason known only to himself, the rouge...vanished. The Family's head steward stepped forward and immediately began researching ways to counteract the spell. Eventually he happened upon a method that worked to keep the Prince alive. It involved taking four Elementals, human Magi gifted with the ability to channel elemental magic, and pouring their life energy into the last son. The hope was that a more permanent cure could be found in the time bought with the Elementals' lives. Since such gifted ones were few, the general populace didn't complain; they just wanted their sovereign to return to them. Rumors began to circulate that if the correct combination of Elementals were gathered, it would permanently shatter the bonds of the spell.

As more and more Magi were burnt out, drained to mere husks of human beings, the search for more 'volunteers' spread out to the boundaries of the kingdom. That Shin had managed to last for so long without anyone discovering his secret in the _Capitol_ was nothing short of a miracle.

Shu shrugged. "I can always say I didn't know. After all, I don't have any of those little gadgets that sniff out Magi. Those...Diahora things" He measured off a space about six inches long between his hands, outlining a Diahora's dimensions.

"I'm not a Magi." Shin said flatly, in a tone that brooked no argument. "It just runs in my family. Goes back fourteen generations."

Shu held up both hands. "Alright, not a Magi." He smiled earnestly at the shorter man. "You can trust me to keep your secret. Just between us now, right?"

Shin nodded slowly, realizing that for the first time there was someone else outside of his family who knew what he was, and had no intention of turning him in for a hefty sum. There was something in Shu's eyes that said this was no lie; that the thought had never even crossed his mind.

"You think we ought to get back to work?" He asked finally.

Shu shook his head. "Not a chance. Somebody else is bound to notice. It might be best if you took a break for a few days, or at least wrapped up your arms anyway." He grinned infectiously and clapped Shin on the shoulder, surprising the slight man with an uncharacteristic shrewdness. "Now how about that drink?"

* * *

AN: *ducks down with her arms over her head* Yes, I AM starting a new series of ficlets! And YES, I realize I have yet to finish a single one, but I swear this won't be nearly as long as my other ones. I hope. I promise decent action in the next chapter, so bear with me, hmm? There's going to be some subtle shounen-ai along the way, and possibly a lemony scene towards the end. I warn you now, so that nobody tries to Bar-B-Que me later. Though if you did, I'd probably just sic my sister's pissy hamster on you. 

Warning: Blatant disregard for the actual age differences and heights of the boys. I have seriously altered their stats, but they all look the same. Forgive me, all you purists. I don't like to let little details get in the way of a good story. Enjoy ^_^


	2. 

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Mark of the Magi

Chapter 2

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimers: Not mine! But I do lay claim to the world, the city, the docks, the clothes they're wearing...or not wearing, as the case may be....but I digress.

Warnings: As before, blatant disregard of actual statistics as far as height and age go. Also, if you're one of those people who like Touma as a moody, quiet little bookworm...well...you're in for some disappointment. There're probably lots of typos too, since I didn't have time to proof read it ^_^;; Sorry....

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Something heavy and insistent pounded violently at the thin wood of Shin's door. The entire tenement almost seemed to shake, and some of the neighbors shouted for him to keep the noise down, dammit! Mouri untangled himself from the thin sheet on his pallet and staggered towards the door, raking a hand through his hair as he went. His eyes were slightly blurred from sleep, but the moonlight through the single open window was more than enough to see by.

The tiny, single roomed apartment was only fifteen by fifteen, and sparsely furnished at that, so it wasn't too much of a challenge to reach the door and pull it open.

"Ah...Shu?" He blinked once or twice to clear the film from his eyes, and frowned slightly in confusion. He hadn't thought the other man knew where he lived.

"You're in serious trouble shrimp!" Shu said shortly, barging his way in and shutting the door securely behind him. Or at least as securely as inch-thick plywood set in a badly sized frame was likely to become.

"Trouble?" Shin echoed. His brain hadn't quite kicked in yet. 

Never one to beat around the bush, Shu fixed him with a direct gaze and said,

"One of the Elementals dropped over dead 'bout an hour ago. They're looking for a replacement right now."

All the color drained out of Shin's face. His eyes darted nervously towards the shutterless window, as if expecting men in Royal livery to come bursting into the room.

"Oh not again..." He breathed softly.

"How did you ever slip away from them before?" Shu wondered aloud.

"Hid down by the piers. In the water," Shin replied absently. "There's something about the ocean that dampens a Diahora's effect." He turned suddenly piercing eyes on the larger man. "Why'd you come here to warn me? If you're found here..."

Shu shrugged awkwardly. "I caught wind of it, and remembered you looked dead tired after hauling today. I didn't think you'd still be awake." He took hold of the still disoriented teen's elbow and pulled him towards the door. "Shouldn't you be going into hiding about now?"

Shin nodded. There wasn't anything here he couldn't do without, especially since he'd slept in his work clothes, with that day's pay tucked into the little pouch on the inside of his belt.

Shu pulled the door open just a little bit too hard, and it came right off the pins that served as hinges. The two exchanged a brief, deadpan sort of glance, before he shrugged and set it aside. Shin knew the rickety old building better, and ghosted down the stairs so silently that he just had to have had practice at it. 

From down below came the sudden, sharp sound of wood splintering as someone smashed the tenement door open. A sickly orange light filled the stairwell, and the heavy thudding of booted footsteps echoed the narrow hall.

"Get up those damn stairs and find what we came for!" Someone shouted "I don't care if you have to raze through every rat-infested hole t'do it!"

"Too late!" Shin choked out the words and made an attempt to dash back up the stairs. One of the men on the floor below caught site of the movement and sent up a shout. Shu caught hold of his smaller friend and leaned over the banister to see perhaps half a dozen men swarming up the stairs. Another stood in back, holding a curious, octagonal crystal in his hand. The hazy light emanated from it, and grew in strength and intensity as he pointed it towards the landing where the two dockers stood, frozen.

"Is there a back way out of here?!" Shu demanded as he backed hurriedly up the stairs.

Shin shook his head. "No, this whole place is built around just these stairs!" He looked around frantically for a window, a place where the boards of the wall were thinner than most, anything that might offer an escape route. 

"Then we'll just have to use the door," Shin looked back at Shu in confusion, and his eyes went wide as the docker grabbed hold of the banister. He flexed the muscles in his shoulders and tore it loose from the stairs. A chunk about five feet wide came off into his hands, and he grinned and hefted it experimentally. He jerked his head, indicating that Shin should get well out of the way. The brown-haired man didn't need to be told twice. He flattened himself against the wall and watched in amazement as his friend set the spar of wood lengthwise across his chest and charged down the stairs with a wild bellow. 

The party of searchers literally went flying off the staircase, hitting the ground hard. Shin didn't waste any time in sprinting after Shu. The other man was already slamming the banister into the shoulder of the man holding the Diahora. The orange crystal went flying, and shattered as it struck the hard stone of the ground floor. The guard himself screamed shrilly in pain as his collarbone splintered under the impact, and the force of the blow drove him to his knees. Shin shot a single backward glance at the faintly flickering shards of crystal, and turned his back on the scene without another thought.

"Come on!" He was already out into the street, and waved Shu towards him. He knew more shortcuts to the docks than anyone else. Being small meant you often had to know escape routes nobody else would ever have considered. The two of them wove their way unerringly through back alleys and supposed dead-ends.

"Do you think they'll send someone after us?" Shu panted; he wasn't really built for distance.

Shin nodded grimly. "Yes. But they'll need to send someone back to the palace to retrieve another Diahora. That should buy us some time." His eyes flickered backwards towards his lumbering companion. "I'm sorry I got you into this. There'll be a price on your head now too, for assaulting an officer."

Shu shrugged. "I was getting sort of bored with Kichis anyway."

Shin almost froze as he realized what his friend had just said; that they would have to leave the city. Now that the guards knew where he had lived, and had a general idea of what he looked like, they would find him sooner or later. And Shu stood out in a crowd. All anyone had to do was ask around the harbor to find out their names and jobs. Their lives in Kichis were officially over as of now.

From up ahead came the sudden sound of something falling to the flagstones with a clatter. A really loud clatter, actually. A shadowy figure darted towards the two young men, and their momentum was too great to halt. The other person crashed into them and all three went down with a mixture of yelps and grunts.

Shu felt something tug at his belt, and realized just what the other person was after. He lashed out with a closed fist and caught the figure a glancing blow to the head.

"Pickpocket!" He growled, tossing the lithe body off of him and disentangling himself from Shin. "Bloody lightfingers!"

The thief tucked into a ball and rolled harmlessly away. In the faint light from the street beyond the alley, it was possible to make out a man's silhouette. He uncoiled from the ball and fell back into a wary crouch.

The three men regarded each other evenly. The light happened to be behind Shu and Shin, which meant they could almost make out the thief's features. Wild blue hair stuck up from every angle, and his face was smudged with soot and dirt. His clothes were even filthier, consisting of a cut off pair of linen breeches, a light vest, and a pair of fingerless leather gloves. He slowly stood and held up his empty hands, realizing he was both outnumbered, and outweighed.

"Hey, no harm meant, you know?" The pickpocket flashed even white teeth in a bright grin. "It's just reflex."

"Reflex my-" Shu started to grab for him, and stopped as a familiar orange light flooded the alley.

"Down there!" Someone called, and there came the clamor of many men trying to fit themselves into the confined space between the walls. The thief shot the two men before him startled glances, obviously wondering whether the officials were after him, or them. 

"Damn it!" Shin snarled, as any trapped creature will. "I thought we'd have more time than this!" His hand fell to the crowbar he always kept in his belt, and he saw Shu tighten his grip on his makeshift staff.

The guards burst around the corner, and seemed slightly surprised to see three men instead of the two they'd originally been chasing. The Diahora blaze like a corrupt sun in the hands of one man, casting an eerie glow over the scene.

"Kraken take this!" The thief spat, and hastily spun on his heel to run, only to find that another contingent of armed men had moved up behind them. He backed up until he accidentally bumped into the stout man.

"What in all the watery hells did you two do?!" He demanded

Shin winced. The thief was anything but innocent, but he didn't deserve to be accused and punished for aiding an Elemental.

"You don't want to know," Shu warned him in a low tone.

"Yeah well, whatever it was, I'm not going down with you!" The pickpocket drew something from a pocket on the inside of his vest and smashed it to the ground. A thick, steel gray smoke rolled through the alley, leaving the guardsmen coughing and sputtering.

Shu and Shin clutched at their throats and fought to draw clean air into their lungs. Though they were right beside each other, their eyes were watering too heavily to make anything out. Except for the fact that the third member of their litter party was now nowhere to be seen.

Shin reached out and took hold of Shu's wrist. Whether he knew it or not, the blue haired man had given them an opportunity to escape as well. He ducked down low and pulled his coughing friend towards the street ahead. They jostled against the guards, but the armed men were too busy hacking up their lungs to notice.

They broke out of the alley, and sucked in deep gulps of salty sea air. The smoke dispersed as soon as it hit the open air of the side street. Shin caught the faint sound of feet fleeing and looked to the right to see the thief disappearing around a corner.

"Follow him," Shu said, his voice a little hoarse from coughing. "He probably knows this area better than we know the docks. He'll have some kind of hidey-hole."

"He's headed for the harbor, any way." Shin replied as he broke into a run again. "We need water to throw off the Diahora."

"I'd nearly forgot," Shu panted. All this running was more work that an entire afternoon hauling crates.

The sounds of pursuit faded. It was late enough at night that most of the after-hours business had already been conducted, and the streets were deserted. Buildings flashed by, houses becoming warehouses as they entered the harbor district. Up ahead were the docks; specifically, the one they'd been working at a few days earlier when the pulley accident had occurred. The gaping hole in the pier had yet to be repaired, and the entire dock had been closed for renovations. Not a bad hiding place, all things considered.

"They probably won't think to look around here," Shin said, slowing his pace to a walk. There was practically no light; they'd left the streetlamps behind on the harbor front. 

"Still, we'd better find some place to lay low," Shu looked around, and was about to point out a few likely spots, when there came a cry of surprise followed by a splash. The dockers looked at one another, eyes wide.

"The thief..." Shin began.

"You don't think he...?" Shu glanced towards the dark splotch where the ragged hole still was.

Shin didn't answer. He took off towards the gap and leaned over the edge. Someone was down there alright, and splashing noisily as he tried to stay afloat. Shin pulled the crowbar from his belt and tossed it aside, then dived down past the jagged spars of broken wood. He hit the water cleanly, and was at the thief's side in a few short strokes. From the way the man had been floundering, it seemed he hadn't had any idea how to swim. The water smelt rank and foul from frigate waste, and other things he didn't really want to contemplate. He towed the sputtering pickpocket towards the wall of the dock, where iron ladders had been nailed to the side.

The blue-haired man needed no help swarming up the rungs. In a few moments, they were both seated on solid ground, soaking wet and panting but in good shape. Shu jogged up just as they were getting their breath back.

"Didn't know that was there, did you?" He seemed to be fighting laughter as he leaned over the thief. The other man glared darkly at him and wrung out the hem of his vest.

"What kind of idiot puts a hole right in the middle of a dock, and doesn't mark it off?!" He growled huffily.

Shin looked to Shu and burst out laughing. He flopped down onto his back and chuckled tiredly. Shu grinned and sank down to the ground as well. He set an elbow on his knee and leaned his chin into his hand.

"We got lucky," He said "They went right past us while you were pulling off that rescue."

"What does the city guard want with you two?" The thief asked curiously, all signs of his earlier anger gone. The quick dunk into the harbor had sluiced off most of the grime and dirt from his skin, leaving him ghost pale in the dark. "You don't exactly look like criminal offenders."

"Nevermind that," Shu snapped. 

The pickpocket shrugged. "It's your business. But I do owe you, or at least, your little friend here, my life. I couldn't swim if my fortune depended on it." He held out a hand to Shin, who sat up. "The name's Touma."

"No last name?" Shin asked curiously, accepting the hand. Touma shook his head, and droplets of water went flying from his bangs.

"Thieves don't have last names. Makes it easier to be found."

Shin nodded, although he didn't quite understand. He squeezed some of the water from his hair and looked over to Shu. "We're safe for now...but we need to get away before they figure out where we've gone. I don't know if a Diahora would be fooled just by proximity to water."

"Dia-...GAH!" Touma sprung to his feet with a curse and backed away from them both. "One of you's an Ele-"

"Think you could shout it out a little louder?" Shu growled. He got back to his feet as well and looked to Shin. "The quickest way out that I can think of would be to book passage on one of the frigates...but I don't have that kind of money."

"Me neither." Shin admitted.

"Why bother paying for something you could steal?" Both of them looked back at the thief, who was grinning again. "There're plenty of little skiffs in the harbor, aren't there?"

Shin glanced at Shu and blinked once or twice. "I hadn't thought of that," He said quietly. 

"Would two be enough to man one of those things?" Shu asked.

"Make that three," Touma butted in, earning himself two more surprised looks. "Either of you know anything about sailing?"

"What makes you think you're coming along?" Shu glared at the lithe little man, who just rolled his eyes. 

"Firstly, you can't work a skiff with just two men. Secondly, you'll need my help to pull off the heist, and thirdly..." His eyes suddenly went hard and cold. "I want out of this cesspit of a city."

"...He has a point," Shin admitted reluctantly. "But you do realize that you'll be in danger if you try to escape with us? If we're caught, they'll string you up as well."

Touma shrugged. "I've done enough quasi-legal stuff that I'd be in the same situation if they caught me alone. Which they may well do, now that they've seen where one of my usual haunts is." 

Shin nodded slowly and turned to Shu. "I think we should bring him with us. He could be of help."

"We don't even know where we're going yet," Shu reminded him. He gave Shin a hard look, but eventually backed down from the determined green eyes. "Fine. It's your call," He held up his hands in defeat and glanced over his shoulder at Touma. "But no funny stuff from you, lightfingers."

Touma smiled angelically, and agreed. "You two seem to know these docks pretty well. Think you could find a place where there'd be a serviceable little boat?" As the other men affirmed this, he smirked. "Good. Pick one out, and I'll be right with you."

"Where do you think you're going?" Shu asked suspiciously. Touma rolled his blue eyes in exasperation. 

"Look, I don't know where we're headed, but I'd be willing to bet that what you're wearing isn't the acceptable dress code," He jerked his chin towards their shirtless-and-shoeless state. "And besides, we'll need some supplies, won't we? Child's play. Now get to work." He melted back into the shadows and disappeared from sight.

"This is a baaaad idea," Shu muttered to himself. Shin chuckled again and got to his feet.

"Come on, let's find ourselves a ride out of here."


	3. 

****

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 3

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimers: Go away, all of you lawyer types. If you think I'm laying claim, you obviously haven't been paying attention

(AN: Wow, lookit how fast I'm getting this out! Do not become used to it! I am tired! We have this stupid writing assessment test at my school, and my wrists and hands HURT dammit! Only massive amounts of RootBeer blocked the pain long enough for me to type this whole thing up. 

And I think all my muses really need is Chicken Soup. The flu-bug caught my poor chibis, so Laura's been picking up the slack. She works well under pressure.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was strange to begin with, having to adjust to the rhythmic bucking and rolling of the sea after so long on dry land. Shin adapted within a few hours, which surprised no one. Shu had a brief, but victorious bout with sea-sickness, and Touma...not quite so brief.

Two days after the confusion in Kichis, daylight found the trio at the head of the Straits of Eon. The first night out had included a great deal of fumbling around in the dark, trying to familiarize themselves with the rigging and equipment aboard their stolen craft. The skiff itself was barely twenty feet long, and worked on two sails. It had a rather deep keel, so running it in fathoms-deep water wasn't a problem. Below decks, they'd strung up makeshift hammocks, and stowed their stolen supplies away in bins made specifically for that purpose. Already they were putting together a sort of pattern of duties. Shu took care of manning the tiller, Shin kept an eye on the sails, which ere in constant need of trimming, and when Touma wasn't too green around the gills, he took care of the rigging. Even Shin was impressed by the thief's ability to shinny up the lines.

"Hey! We made it!" Touma cried, gesturing wildly towards the half-mile wide strip of sea between two sheer sided cliffs. "I thought it'd take longer than this!"

"To hear sailors talk, it's not getting to the Straits that's the tricky part. It's getting through them," Shu said darkly from his position at the stern.

"Eh?" Touma jumped down from his perch on the yardarm, hitting the deck with a light thunk. "What do you mean?"

"Some scheduled ships never show up in the harbor," Shin explained. "They just...vanish. And no one ever hears from their crews again, after they enter the Straits."

"Some people say there's a Kraken that makes it's home at the bottom of the water here," Shu locked an eye on Touma. "Personally, I'd rather not find out for certain."

The thief scoffed. "G'wan, tell me another one."

"You don't believe it's true?" Shu asked mildly.

"Hells no!" Touma crossed his arms and nodded towards the Straits. "No one's seen a Kraken in living memory. And besides, they're supposed to be deep-sea creatures, if the legends have it right. What would one be doing here?" He shook his head mournfully at Shin. "Really shrimp, spreading tales like that. I expected better out of you." He leaned casually back against the starboard railing. "Our bullheaded steersman on the other hand..."

"_Who's_ bullheaded?!" Shu growled, abandoning his post to grab for the thief. The results were similar to trying to snatch a greased pig. Touma snickered and dodged away, taunting Shu from a distance, where it was safe.

"Bullheaded..._steers_man...get it? Whoa! Hey, put that down!"

Shin shook his head and took up Shu's position. He stared pensively at the looming cliffs. Let Touma scoff. He was getting a sinking feeling about the whole thing.

~

"This is..." Shu gawked up at the walls of the Straits, his voice hushed and almost awed.

"Completely unreal," Touma finished. He was nursing a sizeable bump on his skull, but the others' reaction assured him what he was seeing was no mirage.

On either side of the small craft, barriers of stone rose hundreds of feet into the air. The only horizons they could see were the thin strips to the north or south of them. The cliffs only lasted for perhaps a mile, before slowly turning into mountains whose slopes touched the water. Forests of hardwood grew up on either shore, and a few small villages scraped a living out of the mountain soil.

"It's just until we get free of the cliffs that we have to keep our eyes open," Shin said, looking over the portside rail into the enigmatic mirror surface of the water.

"What makes you say that?" Touma questioned, joining him at the side and leaning over it to follow his gaze. "You see something?"

"No," Shin replied, eyes still locked on the choppy waves. "But I can feel it. And it can see me. Distance means nothing to it."

Touma turned and frowned at him in concern. "...Shin? Is something the matter?" He lightly tapped the younger man's shoulder. The younger man jerked as though coming out of a daze, and blinked owlishly at him. "Dammit man, what's wrong with you?"

"His Element's water, right Shin?" Shu spoke up from the tiller. The smaller man nodded and stepped away from the side.

"It comes and goes," He said finally. "Sometimes when I'm nowhere near water, even. I just always have to hope it doesn't happen in public."

"So if he says something's down there, something's down there," Shu said grimly.

Touma took another quick glance over the side, and edged away from it. "I'll just take your word for it." His eyes suddenly lit with curiosity. "How's it work, this talent of yours? What can you do with it?"

"Shin shrugged. "There aren't any schools for this sort of thing. It's just...instinct. I've never tried to do _anything_ with it. But sometimes things just happen" He paused, and his mouth twisted into a bitter line. "Sometimes I wonder why I ended up with it." He sat down and crossed his legs under himself.

Touma flopped down on the deck and crossed his arms behind his head. He stared blankly at the sky for a moment before saying, "I was six when the Royal Family's Magi went rogue. I can sort of remember how it used to be, before that. There _were_ schools for elemental Magi. But those were the first places to be raided for human batteries." There was something unreadable in his voice. Shu looked to Shin over the thief's head, and shrugged. Touma wasn't telling them something, but it wasn't any of their business either way.

"I remember that too," Shu spoke up at last. "I was a little older than you, I think. There was this fire Elemental that lived on the corner of my family's street. 'Course I didn't live in Kichis then. We were closer to the border, so we didn't know about the hunt for Elementals for a while." He grinned crookedly to himself. "I never would have thought you could do much with fire, but she used to be able to do just about anything we needed. I think I was about eight or nine when they finally found her and took her away."

"Huh," Shin mumbled, turning both their stories over in his mind. He'd been too young to recall much of what had happened those twelve years ago. Touma had since stood and was pacing the deck, hands jammed into the pockets of his vests. He watched the imposing stone walls slide by, and fingered a small, smooth worry stone tucked into the cloth. Now even _he_ was beginning to get edgy about this stretch of water.

"What've you got there?" Shu asked genially, nodding towards where the blue haired man was obviously toying with something in his pocket.

"Eh?" Touma looked at him and flashed that guileless grin again. "Nothing, just something I carry around with me to keep my hands occupied. Otherwise I might, y'know, start lifting things just to keep in practice."

"You had better not, lightfingers."

Shin just laughed and tugged at the rope that tightened the sails. They'd gone a little more slack than he liked, and he really wanted to get through the first mile of the Straits before something happened.

The skiff gave a sudden little shudder. The vibration shook the occupants of the small craft, and they all grabbed for something to steady themselves with.

"What was that?!" Touma demanded.

"It felt like we scraped over a rock or something..." Shu frowned. "There could be damage to the hull."

Shin swore softly. He hadn't seen anything, but that didn't mean nothing was there. Besides, there were reefs along the Straits of Eon; charts and maps brought in by ship Captains proved as much.

"Drop anchor. I'll go down and take a look," He offered. "If something's amiss, I can make a quick repair and we can pull up at the first likely spot we find and rig up a more permanent fix." He felt a little uneasy about doing so, given his previous feeling of being watched by something immensely old and powerful, but they couldn't afford to spring a leak now.

Shu nodded. "Touma, see if you can find a spare line. I'm not letting him go down without something to pull him back in with. Just in case."

The thief nodded and hurried below decks. He searched around for a minute or two before finding a suitable length of rope.

Up on deck, Shin shucked off his shirt and accepted one end of the rope as Touma passed it to him. He looped it around his waist and tied it tightly; you didn't spend five years of your life working on a dock and _not_ learn how to tie sailors' knots. The other end was quickly secured to the mast while the anchor was heaved overboard and the sails were left slack.

"Tug once on it if there's anything wrong, and twice if you want to come back up," Shu instructed him.

"Any more than that and we'll assume something with lots of teeth thought you looked tasty," Touma joked, and instinctively ducked the cuff Shu threw his way.

"I thought you didn't believe in all that Kraken stuff?" He said mockingly.

"I don't, but it's fun to watch you two go all pale. Besides, Krakens don't have teeth. I was thinking more along the lines of giant sharks."

Shin rolled his eyes and knifed off the railing into the water. A cloud of silvery bubbles followed him downward; he opened his eyes to watch them drift back upwards, and wasn't bothered in the least by the sting of the salt. This felt good. Right. The water slid around his skin like wet silk as he allowed himself to sink a little deeper to inspect the hull of the skiff.

Beneath his slowly kicking feet was an endless chasm of slowly darkening shades of blue. He could actually see the colors graduate from cornflower to sapphire, to midnight velvet, and finally into gradients of black. He shivered suddenly, and forced his mind away from thinking about all that empty space. There was a limit to how long he could stay underwater. After all, even water Elementals had to breathe.

A quick look at the keel showed nothing more than a little barnacle accumulation. Shin frowned to himself and ducked under the boat to take a look at the other side. Again, nothing. There was no strain on his lungs yet, but no matter how much he'd like to have stayed in the water just a while longer, he'd better get back topside and tell the other two it was safe to get a move on. 

Some alarm in the back of his head suddenly went on red alert, blaring and flashing in a manner that could only mean incredible danger. Shin looked about himself, but saw nothing. Not a fish in sight. Which, now that he thought about it, was a little strange...

The dark pit beneath him began to surge upwards. Bubbles the size of the skiff billowed upward towards the surface. Shin decided rather quickly that it would be in his best interests to follow them. He pushed away from the hull of the craft and kicked out to head back to the world above. The core of blackness screamed, quite loud enough that he could hear it even below the water. Something uncoiled from the darkness with all the speed of a bullwhip. It lashed around his ankle and held him firm. He tugged urgently at the rope around his waist, but there was no response from above; not even a pull. Two pools of blood red opened up from the pit. Black slits split them widthwise from top to bottom. Very slowly, they blinked. He yanked on the rope again, but there was still no reaction. What the hell was going on up there?!

The keening cry tore through the water again, and the two red floodlights rushed upwards at a terrifying speed. Shin caught a brief flash of a beaked mouth opening, and the ridiculously tiny tongue inside of it, before a mass of writing tentacles wrapped their way around his body and began to drag him back down to the depths. He opened his mouth involuntarily to cry out, and the air in his lungs escaped in a mass of bubbles that hung around his head for a moment like a halo. The line about his waist snapped taut as it reached its limits, and for a heart-stopping second, Shin thought the entire skiff would be dragged under along with him. Then another of the tentacles whipped right through the rope, and he felt it go slack.

Shin tried to push back against the constraining limbs, but found that they were wrapped far too tight around his body. He scraped his palms raw on the Kraken's abrasive skin, and it did little good. His lungs were screaming and suffocating themselves as they tried to draw air from his bloodstream. His head pounded and rang with the noise of a dozen bells, and the world was slowly evaporating into a violet-laced cloud of black.

From deep within him, something roiled and snapped. It ripped loose from the bindings he'd imposed upon it, and came roaring forward with all the force of a tidal wave. The water surrounding his body began to whirl and froth. The miniature whirlpool picked up speed and momentum, until the tentacles wrapped around the young man were viciously torn from the Kraken's body by the sheer velocity. It screamed again, and surged forward to snatch at its prey. The ocean refused to give him up. Violent under-toes pounded the Kraken back towards the depths, creating more and more eddies that ripped away its limbs and skin. The water went cloudy with black blood, and the Straits appeared more like an inkwell than a strip of sea.

Shin wasted no time wondering at the strange turn of events. He pushed himself towards the light and air as quickly as he could.

~During the same time period, topside~

Silence had descended shortly after Shin disappeared from sight. The other two men peered anxiously over the side.

"You think he's okay?" Touma asked after a short period of quiet.

"Why wouldn't he be?"

"...All that talk about Krakens..."

"Ah HAH! I knew you were just as superstitious as the rest of us!"

"Oh why don't you just-" Touma halted mid-retort and cocked his head to the side. "Do you hear anything?"

Shu paused and frowned, straining his ears. "No, not a thing. Maybe there's something wrong with you after all."

"Har har har. Shut your mouth for a few minutes and _listen_." 

Growling quietly under his breath, Shu did as he was told, and fell entirely silent as he realized that there _was_, in fact, something out there. It sounded almost like someone was...singing?

"What is that?" He asked aloud.

"Wind through the rocks, maybe?" Touma suggested hesitantly. He was fiddling with the worry stone again. 

"No...no that's definitely a voice. Someone's out there."

"But singing?!" The thief snorted incredulously. "Who would be standing on a cliff-top, singing at the top of their lungs?" Shu just shrugged, not really knowing either. 

The voice grew even louder, filling their ears with a sweet, soprano that rose and fell in time with the waves. It became almost hypnotic, drowning out the sound of the surf pounding against the cliffs without ever seeming to increase in volume. Both young men stood frozen, held in place by the bonds of music. 

A figure seemed to melt out of the rock face. A young woman stood atop an outcropping stone, mouth open in song. She smiled serenely down at the boat, wearing nothing much other than that smile. A strand of kelp wound about the significant part of her torso, and another hung from her waist as a very basic kind of skirt. Bracelets of shell-studded braided seaweed hung from her wrists and ankles. Tangled ebon dark hair streamed down her back and clung to her shoulders and arms. Cerulean blue eyes glinted with something akin to hunger as she laughed, and the laugh wove its way into the music.

Touma found his eyes locked on the woman, and his body moved without any conscious trigger from him. His hands closed around the portside railing, and he was just bracing one foot against it, poised to dive off, when the song shattered into a shriek of pure rage.

The woman on the rock shelf screamed and the water of the Straits began to heave and churn. The sea took on a night-black cast, and something else added its voice to the woman's. She turned her furious gaze on the small craft, and her features twisted and blurred until she was hardly beautiful any longer. She hissed at them, and vanished back into the stone, leaving two very mystified men behind.

Touma looked over at Shu, and found the other man also about ready to jump into the sea. He yelped and leapt back down to the deck, reaching out to pull Shu with him.

"What the hell were we _doing?!_" He asked rhetorically, his eyes wide and startled.

"That's what _I'd_ like to know!" Shin's voice came from behind them. He was just hauling himself over the starboard railing onto the skiff. He was covered in the brackish water, and very short of breath.

"What happened to you?!" Shu gasped, kneeling next to the sprawled teen to help him back to his feet.

"Kraken," Came the short reply. "Came up from beneath me."

"Why aren't you dead?" Touma asked incredulously. "How could you have escaped a Kraken?!"

"Don't think I did on my own," Shin replied, turning his head to spit out a mouthful of fishy tasting water. "Something happened...I don't know." He turned troubled eyes on the both of them. "What about you two?"

Shu looked to Touma, still mystified. "We saw a woman...singing..."

"A Siren!" Shin exclaimed.

Touma rubbed thoughtfully at his chin. "A Siren and a Kraken strike us simultaneously? That can't be coincidence."

"Sure it wasn't," Shu said, struck by a sudden flash of insight. "They were partners. The Siren distracts the passengers of a ship long enough for the Kraken to sink it, and then they split the goods."

Shin shuddered. "And it nearly worked. Part of the Kraken's role must have been to get the ship in question to stop long enough for the Siren to work her magic. That was no rock we scraped up against."

"A nearly flawless plan," Touma nodded in grudging admiration. "They forgot one possibility though. That one of their victims might be a water Elemental." He grinned brightly at Shin. 

Shu helped the exhausted young man to his feet, still looking slightly disturbed. "But still...a Siren and a Kraken? Not exactly a well matched pair."

Touma shrugged. "Survival makes for strange companions, I guess."

All Shin really wanted was to collapse into his hammock and sleep for a week, fish smell or no, but he smiled tiredly at Touma's words and looked back and forth between his two friends.

"It does indeed."


	4. 

****

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 4

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimers: I lay no claim to the characters you see here. However, I will accept donations from Sunrise! Authors Notes (and replies to reviews) at the end of the Chapter, because I don't want to give anything away....

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The skiff was swept towards the ends of the Straits of Eon shortly before sunset. Touma and Shu made the decision to pull up on land for the night. Shin had been asleep below decks for hours, and showed no signs of waking.

Touma yawned and gestured towards the shore. "There's a bank there we could pull up to."

Shu echoed the yawn and steered in the direction he indicated. "We'll just tie up offshore. Easier that way."

They drifted closer towards the embankment, being careful of rocks beneath the surface of the water. Shu jumped over board and splashed down into waist deep water. His teeth began to chatter together as he caught hold of the rope Touma tossed his way. He waded ashore, uncoiling the line as he went. There came a faint splash from behind as the anchor splunked into the water.

In short order, the skiff had been secured, the sails furled, and firewood gathered for the night. Shu and Touma sat on the deck, watching as the stars blinked into life one by one. They built up a cookfire inside a large, slightly concave bronze dish that had been stowed away in the hold. All small ships had one, it served as a kind of portable stove. Touma set a pan of water boiling above it and put together a sort of stew from odds and ends of dried rations.

Stomach full with a hot meal, Shu began to nod off. His chin sank down onto his chest and he struggled against the suddenly weighty pull of his eyelids. Touma watched in amusement as he appeared to drop off twice before jerking himself back awake again.

"Why don't you head below and get some sleep?" He said finally, fearing that if this kept up much longer, Shu would fall forward right into the leftovers. "I'll stay up here and keep watch."

"For what?" Shu yawned and stretched.

"Pursuit, of course," Touma said matter-of-factly. "Just because we haven't seen any doesn't mean it isn't there."

"Don't you need sleep, though?" Shu paused on his way towards the covered steps and glanced back at him.

"I'm a night person by profession," The thief reminded him. "I'll catch a few hours in the morning while you two see if there's anything out here we can use. We'll work out a more permanent watch schedule once the shrimp gets back on his feet."

Shu chuckled and waved a goodnight over his shoulder. He descended the stairs and had to duck down in the low-ceilinged room below decks. A small oil lamp hung from the beams overhead, and he reached up to turn up the flame. The tiny little cabin space lit with a faint, warm light that was just enough to see by.

Shin lay curled into a defensive ball in his hammock. How he managed to sleep like that without falling out was a mystery. One arm dangled over the edge, his fingers barely brushing the floor as the hammock swayed in time with the ship's movement. Dark bruises marred his skin where the Kraken had had its hold on him, ranging from dark blue-black to purple yellow where the water had made a token effort at healing the damage.

Shu bent over him and carefully moved his arm back inside the hammock. He pulled the blanket up over the younger man's shoulders and sighed in relief when he didn't wake. His own hammock refused to cooperate. It insisted on folding up to one side at every attempt to sit down in it. He swore quietly and grappled with the recalcitrant length of cloth.

Eventually he got himself situated to the point where he didn't think he'd fall out during the night. The ceiling was low enough that it was a simple matter to reach up and turn the lamp down for the night.

~

Touma paced the deck and fed the fire. The air became chilly out on the Straits at night. He sighed and leaned against the mast, watching the ocean in the direction of Kichis. Boredom set in; he was beginning to regret his offer to stand watch alone. There was absolutely nothing to do up here except stare out at the water as the moonlight created stained-glass patterns on the surface. While it was pretty enough, it did little to distract him. He drew the worry-stone from his pocket and slipped it expertly between and over his fingers. It dipped in and out of sight like a coin, and if Touma hadn't been so preoccupied with the stretch of sea, he might have noticed the faint blue glow emanating from the stone.

Minutes stretched into hours, broken only by the rhythmic lapping of the waves against the skiff.

Touma's ears perked upwards as something else came by on the wind. He heard the creaking of rope and wood, and hushed conversation. A few trailing lights rounded the corner into the Straits, and the noise grew louder. Touma smothered an involuntary curse and quickly kicked the fire-pan overboard. It hissed and spat as the superheated metal hit the chill water. Steam rose in a small billowing cloud. Touma flattened himself to the deck and held his breath. Either the occupants of the other ship were unbelievably unobservant, or...they didn't want to be seen either.

An intriguing thought, that. Touma watched as the other craft, which really wasn't much larger than their own, sailed on by in total silence. It disappeared again around an outcropping rock formation.

The blue-haired young man sat up and crossed his arms atop the railing to watch the stern vanish. Something about the small ship smelled wrong to him. He slid over the rail into the water as silently as he could manage and made his way ashore. It didn't seem like anything or anyone would be coming for them, and his curiosity had gotten the better of him. That was how he'd become a thief in the first place; overactive curiosity.

He didn't have to go far before he heard splashing and human voices calling out to one another. The standing stone sentinels of the rocky beaches were more than enough cover for an experienced thief. Touma scrambled silently up one wind-beaten boulder and watched with interest as a crew of about half a dozen men made camp on the pebbly beach. One man scooped out a shallow trench for a fire, and two others brought food and what appeared to be casks of wine ashore. Each cask was marked with some kind of seal. He couldn't quite make it out from such a distance, or in such inferior light, but it almost seemed to be some sort of creature whose front end resembled a bird, and the rear a lion. A many rayed sun made up the background. Touma rested his chin on the stone and blinked thoughtfully. He'd be willing to bet his current freedom that that wine wasn't from anywhere inside of Taidem. These men were running more or less quietly, and at night. Every clue marked them as smugglers. And smugglers who didn't have enough sense to leave their goods alone, at that.

That just about made up his mind to get back to his own ship and leave them to their business. It was probably best not to interfere with that sort of thing. He almost turned and made a retreat.

Almost.

Two other men splashed ashore, and it soon became obvious that one's hands were lashed together behind his back. He stumbled and nearly fell as the smuggler gave him a hefty shove, but regained his footing and shot a quick murderous glare at his captor. The would-be-pirate smirked and pushed the prisoner down to the ground where he could be watched.

Touma settled back down and watched as the smugglers proceeded to get smashed off their asses. He studied their captive, puzzling out the possible reasons they'd be Kichis bound with human cargo.

He could have been some sort of foreign noble, the thief thought. He had that sort of unconscious arrogance or presence of command that they all seemed to possess. Locks of blonde hair hung loose from a short ponytail at the nape of his neck, and his eyes were almost impossible to see past a wild fringe of bangs. He looked battered, and a little worse for wear; his clothes had been torn and scuffed, and there were visible scrapes and bruises on his collarbone. 

The only obvious explanation he could come up with was as some sort of slave. Except that slavery was outlawed in Taidem. At least, it was [i]_officially_[/i]. There were always rich men and women who could pass slaves off as 'indentured servants', whose salary would go towards paying off their debts. Only the debts were nonexistent, and the servants were never paid. 

Touma could think of only one possible future for the blonde man. There was a small, but very lucrative market for body slaves in Kichis. This man was far too...well...[i]pretty[/i] for any other outcome. He shuddered, and wondered if the poor guy had any idea what was in store for him at the other end.

Now he definitely needed to get away. There was no sense in giving these smugglers/slavers any more stock. Especially since their destination seemed to be the place he was escaping from. Another shiver clawed through his body as he thought of his friends sleeping all unawares back on their skiff. The slavers would eat the Shrimp [i]alive[/i], until they found out he was an Elemental and could be sold for a lot more than his looks would bring on the slave market. Shu would probably be sent to one of the quarries, or some other manual labor-intensive site. 

It didn't bear thinking about.

Touma slid backwards down the boulder, casting one last sympathetic look at the blonde man. Through a truly strange twist of fate, the captive happened to raise his head from contemplating the ground, and stared through the darkness towards the thief's hiding spot. Touma was certain that the man couldn't have seen or heard him...but for a split second they locked eyes.

The blue-haired thief groaned silently to himself. He couldn't just walk away and leave the man to a fate that many would consider worse than death.

"Bloody conscience..." He muttered quietly. A quick review of the situation presented only one feasible option; wait until the smugglers got really, really drunk, sneak in, free the man, and get the hell out. Nice and simple. Any elaborations would have to be made up on the spot. Considering how deeply the crew of the smuggler's craft was dipping into their own cargo, he wouldn't have long to wait. Good thing too; the boulder was beginning to dig into his hip. 

The small sliver of the Golden Moon had set, and the Silver Disk was just beginning its arc across the heavens when Touma was jolted from his half-doze by raucous snoring. He took a quick peek over the top of his cover, noting that all the smugglers had collapsed in various positions of drunken stupor. The blonde man still sat stoically before the fire. Touma judged this to be the best opportunity he was likely to receive, and stole out from behind the boulder. They couldn't have chosen a better moment to pass out; the sky was temporarily absent of most moonlight, and so it was a simple thing for him to sneak up to the 'campsite'. 

"Hold still, and stay quiet," He hissed in the captive's ear. The man never so much as batted an eyelash. Only a minute tensing of the muscles in his shoulders betrayed his surprise at the voice in his ear. Touma drew a short bladed knife from his belt and quickly sawed through the rope binding the man's wrists together. The hemp had spent several years soaked in sea-spray, and was stiff with crusted salt. But Touma never let his blades grow dull, and the rope parted beneath the keen edge after a few moments' work.

It must have been painful for the blonde to have the circulation suddenly return to his hands after so long with them bound. But to his credit, he flexed his fingers a few times and turned to snare Touma with a frighteningly calm gaze.

"What now?" He asked coolly, obviously expecting Touma to have some sort of plan in the works. Fortunately, spending years as a pickpocket had taught him to think on his feet. 

"Follow my lead," Said the thief. He crept over to the nearest unconscious man and gave him a quick rap to the back of his skull with the pommel of the knife so as to ensure the sleep would be deepened. He grabbed the man under the arms and dragged him over the stony ground towards the waiting boat. The cold water lapped at his legs, and soaked the unconscious smuggler, but didn't seem to be waking him. Fortunately, they had left a rope ladder dangling over the side of their craft, so all Touma had to do was take hold of the man's collar and haul him up on board. He looked back over his shoulder and noticed the blonde following his lead.

The Silver Disk was at its apex by the time they finished hauling the crew back onto the ship. Touma lashed the tiller so that they would sail right through the Straits on the currently prevailing wind, and picked all their pockets for good measure. He hacked through the anchor-line and jumped back overboard as the boat began to drift. The wind chose that moment to pick up, and it quickly disappeared from sight. Touma spat after it in disdain, and curled his lip in disgust.

"Here's hoping the Kraken gets them," He said fervently. The blonde at his side remained silent. Touma noticed that during the last trip on board, he'd grabbed up a carry sack from the cabin, and slung a sword from his hip. The weapon didn't look like the sort of disreputable blades smugglers would carry; the sheath was of tooled leather, and well oiled. He couldn't see the sword itself, but he got the feeling it wouldn't be a cheap, two bit, pot-metal affair.

"So..." He said finally, after a lengthy silence.

"I never thanked you for your assistance." The blonde said. There was a curious lilt to his voice, suggesting that while he certainly spoke the language fluently, it was not his native tongue. He shook his hair from his eyes and held a hand out. Touma grasped it in his own, and raised a mental eyebrow at the feel of sword calluses and rough places where hard work had marked his skin. Nobles didn't usually bother with anything strenuous, and the more he was around this man, the more he thought that was what he must be. Only now he was getting mixed signals.

"It wasn't anything, really," He replied, "If they'd been conscious...now that might have been challenging."

The other man just nodded and shouldered his pack. "I am in your debt."

"We'll call it even if you'll explain to me just what those men wanted with you," Touma offered. The thought of someone this...intimidating owing him anything gave him a slight case of the chills. It was almost as if the blonde was suggesting that Touma had done something [i]wrong[/i] by saving him and placing a favor owed on his shoulders. 

The silence was becoming awkward again; they just sort of stared at each other, while the thief waited, and the nameless man tried to decide whether or not he was being serious.

"I thought they must be in the slaving business, but I could be wrong," Touma prompted.

"Yes. It was...something along those lines."

Talk about your one-sided conversations! Touma blew at his bangs in frustration. His brows knit together in a scowl.

"You wouldn't happen to have a name or anything like that, would you?"

"Ah," The blonde's eyebrows went up a fraction of an inch, acknowledging a breach in etiquette. "My name is Seiji, of Clan Date."

Touma mulled this over even as he returned his own name. Clan hmm? Then he really wasn't from around here. That sort of familial title was found more prominently in the West.

"You're a long way from home, aren't you?" He cocked his head to one side and allowed his curiosity to seep into his voice. "It's really none of my business, but we don't get Westerners in Taidem much; not since the debacle with the Royal Family, anyway."

"Let us just say it's a family matter, and leave it at that, shall we?" Seiji turned to leave, striking towards the woods that rose up past the scrub brush. 

"TOUMA! Damn you man, where the hell have you been?!" Shu's angry voice split the late-night quiet as effectively as a sledgehammer. He rounded the boulder and stormed towards the blue-haired man, completely ignoring the blonde in his anger. Shin paused in following him to lean against the stone and yawn. The Water Elemental currently suffered from a serious case of bed-head.

"I was-"

"Nevermind that! You were supposed to be keeping watch!"

"But I-!"

"You walked out on us, that's what you did!"

"Hey, I-!"

"Lousy, good-for-nothing, lightfingers!"

"Would you just-!"

"We could have been slaughtered in our sleep while you were off taking a stroll!"

"Shu, maybe you ought to let him explain?" Shin suggested mildly, knuckling at his eyes.

Touma mentally elevated the smaller man to the position of Saint. He launched into his story, telling how he had seen the other ship and thought it seemed suspicious it would just pass them by in the night, and how he had snuck after it and realized that the crew had to have been smugglers. Noticing the storm clouds gathering on Shu's brow, he picked up the pace and blurted out the rest about the rescue and sending the slavers on their way. Minus their wallets, of course. He emptied out his pockets at that point, dumping the money-pouches onto the gravely sand. If that wouldn't keep them going for a while, he didn't know what would.

"And if you don't believe me," He said finally, "You can just ask him!" He jabbed a finger at Seiji for added emphasis.

Both Shu and Shin had been so caught up in the rapid-fire storytelling that they hadn't noticed the blonde until that point. Shu started in surprise, wondering how he could have possibly missed him. He was about to apologize for subjecting the stranger to their argument, when he noticed the man was scrutinizing Shin with an almost frightening intensity.

The stare hadn't gone unnoticed by the Elemental either. He unconsciously pressed himself back against the rough granite of the boulder. In two or three long strides, Seiji stood before him, and caught his chin in his hand. Shin swallowed hard as lavender eyes bored into his. The blonde raised his free hand and traced something into the air between their faces with his index finger. A faintly glowing sigil hung there, pulsating faintly with verdant and gold light. Touma and Shu gasped in startled surprise as a very light blue aura lit up around the Elemental, outlining him in turquoise.

Seiji sighed in an almost resigned fashion and stepped away, releasing his grip on the other man. Shin let out a breath he hadn't been aware of holding and watched as the symbol faded away into a quickly dissipating mist. 

"You are an Elemental Magi, no?" Date looked at him almost accusingly, and Shin found himself nodding automatically. The pale man muttered something to himself in a language none of them had heard before, and pinched the bridge of his nose as though warding off a headache.

"I am also a Magi," He said by way of explanation, "Although I have only a small Elemental talent."

"Ahhh, so [i]that's[/i] what the smugglers wanted with you," Touma exclaimed. Seiji nodded and cast a rather dark look out towards the water where they had last seen the other ship.

"Yes. I was unaware of the demand for Elementals in this country. I came here on family business and extended some of my talent in the wrong place at the wrong time. I have already been delayed several weeks, thanks to them," He fixed Shin with his eyes again, seeming wryly amused this time. "Unfortunately, it seems I will have to put off my duties a while longer."

"What do you mean by that?" Shu asked suspiciously. He moved towards his friend in a protective manner, obviously not trusting the blonde.

"Part of the oath I swore when I accepted my rank as a Magi was to offer tutelage to any talented, but untrained, persons in need of instruction. And you, boy, are about as raw as they come,"

"Hey!" Shin bristled, though he wasn't too sure whether he was annoyed at the reference to his lack of skill, or being called 'boy'.

"As you are now you are a threat to yourself and those around you," Seiji said sternly. "And you are also a Water Element. Surrounded as you are by ocean, that is a dangerous scenario."

"If I might offer a possible solution?" Touma cleared his throat to catch their attention. "You, Date, need to get somewhere, and since I dislike the thought of drowning, Shin needs instruction. We happen to have a boat, and no set destination in mind, so...."

"You would trade transportation for tutoring?" The foreigner thought it over for a moment or two before nodding. "Yes, I think that would work out to everyone's gain."

Shu looked at Shin and shook his head. "Do you get the feeling that we have no say in this?" Shin just nodded and smiled weakly; he seemed to have no control over his life anymore. When had things gotten so complicated?

"I hope you don't mind sleeping in a hammock," Touma was saying as they headed back up the beach towards the skiff. "And you'd better not snore. We get enough of that out of our resident muscle head."

"Dammit Lightfingers! You just don't know when to quit!" Shu roared, tearing off down the beach after the fleeing thief. Seiji and Shin paused and watched them go at it.

"...I'm beginning to regret my decision," The blonde said finally.

"You get used to it. Quickly." Shin chuckled. "Or you'd better anyway. It's looking to be a long journey."

(AN: Hmm...let's see...This marks the last member of the party. From here on out, there will be no more unexpected guests, but plenty of cameos if I have my way. You have NO idea how weird it felt to introduce Seiji first-name-first. I felt like I was committing sacrilege or something!

Oh, one more thing. I've decided to be a complete heretic and NOT let Touma be an archer. Because to be honest, I don't know where he would have picked up that skill in his current profession. Also, I mentioned two moons in this chapter; I just thought I'd point out that this AU happens to have that many ^_^.)


	5. 

****

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 5

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimers:...Oh hell, I'm too tired to go through the effort. BTW, this chapter is kinda long...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"I can't DO THIS!"

"It's not that you can't, it's that you don't want to."

"What does that matter?"

"Working with this power is very much like training a large animal; it knows if your heart isn't in the matter at hand."

Shin sighed and slumped back against the small cabin. "Your telling me this talent of mine is sentient? That it _thinks_?" 

"In a very real sense, yes," Seiji nodded and pushed a shallow bowl, half full of water, towards him. "Now try it again."

"Go for it Shin," Touma encouraged from the cabin roof. He was lying on his stomach, with his arms crossed beneath his chin. "At least it gives the rest of us something to watch."

"I'm glad you're finding this so entertaining," Shin scowled. A shadow of a headache was beginning to gather behind his eyes. All of the exercises Seiji put him through required intense concentration on his part. He fixed his eyes on the bowl, brows drawing inward as he reached down inside himself to touch that same force he'd tapped during the struggle with the Kraken. There were barriers there, familiar ones. They ought to be, he'd put them in place himself, unconsciously, by refusing to acknowledge his abilities for so long. The power behind the barriers surged and churned like the sea during a storm. It wanted out; the tricky part was controlling how much managed to escape.

He reached out to the core of energy, and a warm feeling flooded through his veins. His hands tingled with a pins-and-needles sensation, itching to reach out to the bowl. However, for this particular exercise, he had been forbidden to use any gestures or words to help focus the power. Such things were unnecessary, Seiji told him, and used only because many people thought they were.

The water within the bowl began to ripple and move almost as though it were a sort of gel, and not a liquid. Beads of sweat began to appear on Shin's forehead; he couldn't understand why it was so _hard_ to manipulate such a small amount, when he had brought an entire section of ocean under his control a few days earlier. The water surged up out of the bowl, hovering a few inches above the rim in a shapeless, shifting mass. Shin gripped at his knees in an effort to keep from using his hands to shape the blob. The headache stabbed fiercely at his temples now. He gritted his teeth together and dug his nails into his knees; the pain helped him to focus. The water slowly began to condense into a sphere, resembling nothing so much as a fishbowl without the benefit of glass. 

"Hrm..." Seiji muttered, which might have meant anything really. Shin chose to interpret it as a sign that he was doing a satisfactory job at least.

Shu happened upon the exercise as he climbed up the short flight of stairs from the cabin, a small collapsible spyglass held in one hand, and a rolled up piece of parchment in the other. He stopped to watch in amazement, and the door slammed shut behind him with a sharp _crack_!

Everyone jumped and yelped in surprise...with the exception of Seiji, who twitched a bit. Touma nearly fell from the low roof, and Shin lost any and all control over the water sphere.

The small globe exploded in a shower of salt water, pelting them all with the force of a hailstorm. They all threw up their arms to shield their faces. It seemed there was more water flying into their eyes than the little bowl could have possibly held. A globule flew straight into Touma's mouth as he sucked in a sharp breath of air, and he promptly keeled over coughing. He pounded at his chest with a fist and glared through bleary eyes at Shu.

"Nice going!! It's a damn good thing he's not a fire Elemental!"

"How was I to know what was going on up here?!" Shu defended himself.

Seiji pushed dripping bangs out of his eyes and fixed Shin with a neutral gaze. The younger man was rubbing at his temples; the sudden shattering of his concentration resulted in a nasty backlash that aggravated his already aching head. Shin ignored the bickering with an effort, and concentrated on putting the storm walls back up against the internal power spring. For three days now, since Seiji had joined their little party, he'd been trying to master these exercises, with precious little success. 

"It doesn't matter what distractions present themselves," The blonde said quietly to him. "You must be able to control your talent under any circumstances."

Shin shot him a venomous glare from behind his own drenched hair. "You're doing this deliberately, aren't you?"

Seiji smiled faintly. "Perhaps,"

"What if I told you _exactly_ where you could stick that advice of yours?" The headache served to make him cranky.

Seiji laughed, surprising his intrepid student. He reached over and clapped Shin on the shoulder.

"It probably doesn't seem like it to you, but you're doing _very_ well," He said, voice warm with approval. "Controlling smaller amounts of matter is always more difficult than huge blasts of energy, and less damaging in the long-run."

"I've only ever used huge blasts," Shin ducked his head almost shyly. "I guess I don't see the point of anything less effective."

"Most of what a Magi does has nothing to do with big, impressive spells," Seiji settled back and went into 'lecture mode'. "The every day usages for power are rarely flashy. Mostly only small magics are used to make day to day life a little bit easier. Elementals are confined only to their respective elements. Magi work mostly with matter, creating and manipulating it as they will," He reached out a hand, palm up, and light flashed to life about an inch above his skin. It jumped and writhed like a candle flame, twisting into shapes that might or might not have had a meaning. Seiji closed his hand around the light, allowing it to glow redly through his flesh to reveal the shadows of bone before extinguishing.

"So you're some kind of light element?" Touma asked curiously.

Seiji nodded. "As I said before, I have only a slight Elemental talent. My main skill is Empathy."

"Not to seem ignorant or anything," Shu interjected "But...Empathy?"

"'An understanding and imaginative experiencing of how someone else is feeling,'" Touma quoted, drawing strange looks from Shin and Shu. "What?! There _are_ public libraries in Kichis, you know."

"I could see how that might be useful," Shin nodded to Seiji, ignoring Touma's indignation. "Is it a rare talent?"

Seiji made a rueful sort of snort. "Rare enough. I have yet to meet another Empath that approaches my abilities."

"...If it's so rare, and you're so gifted...what are you doing out in the middle of nowhere with us?" Touma murmured softly. 

Seiji leaned back against the side of the skiff and sighed. He shut his eyes for a moment, leaving the other three to wonder if he would answer at all. Shu took cross-legged seat below Touma's perch on the roof, folding his arms over his chest and waiting.

"It's a matter of family duty, really," The blonde man said after a few lengthy moments of silence. "There is a man who...." He paused and shook his head before starting again. "I'm going to have to explain something of Western culture to you. You see, among the Clans, it's not at all unusual for a father to arrange marriages for his children," Seiji stared pensively at his hands, clasped tightly together in his lap. "My father set up such a match for my older sister with a very well-respected older man of another Clan. Both families agreed to the match, and the melding of the Clans, but the man in question disappeared after the wedding night."

"You mean you're out here looking for a runaway groom?" Touma arched a sky-blue brow in something like mockery. "That's a little bit redundant, don't you think? It's kind of obvious he doesn't want anything to do with your sister. Just get your father to set up another wedding."

Shin hid his face behind his hand. Open mouth, insert foot. "Touma...aren't you being just a little bit...rude?" Shu shoved his fist upward into the small eve of the cabin roof, causing the wood beneath the thief to jump.

"Let the man finish his story."

Seiji's mouth twisted up into a bitter line. "You don't understand. If the groom is not brought back, it will result in open warfare between both Clans. A marriage contract is sacred and thoroughly binding," He set his chin into his hand and sighed again. "Not to mention that my sister will be unable to marry anyone else, with her virtue in question."

"Oh," Touma said in a small voice. "I see."

"How do even know where to start looking, though?" Shin frowned. "Did he leave any clues behind about where he was heading?"

"None," Seiji shook his head. "But I will be able to find him regardless."

"Again, I hate to question the obvious, but why's that?" Shu asked.

"The man I'm searching for is a Magi, as well as my teacher. I can get a vague feeling as to his whereabouts, that strengthens as I travel nearer. We're currently heading in the general direction of his aura." He looked at Shin, and chuckled humorlessly. "I neglected to mention that detail to you; the teacher-pupil bond, that is."

Shin shrugged. "I don't think it'll matter much. After you find this man and go home, you'll be too far away for any sort of feeling to bother me."

"Speaking of distance," Shu said, unrolling the thick tube of vellum he'd been carrying, "We should come within reach of a fishing village before nightfall. If we're where I think we are, that is. Maybe you'll find your runaway there?"

Seiji grunted a negative and got to his feet. "No, he's too far away for that. If he was within a day's travel, I would have been able to pick out his exact location."

"...Hey, Seiji?" Touma rested his cheek against his forearm and blinked at the blonde with inquisitive eyes. "I know a little bit about Western culture...and it just occurred to me that it really wouldn't matter if your sister was able to marry or not, would it? After all, it's the offspring of the eldest _son_ that inherits leadership of the Clan, isn't it? Why should it be such a big deal if she spawns or not?"

Lavender eyes narrowed in some unreadable expression. Touma swallowed hard and fought the urge to duck down away from the laser-gaze. There was enough chill in those irises to coat the ocean in a film of ice. Without replying, Seiji pushed past the door to the cabin, and disappeared below decks.

"...I think you touched on a nerve, Touma," Shin said finally.

"Do you even think about the things that come out of your mouth?!" Shu stood and grabbed the thief by the back of his vest. He hauled him off the low roof and down to the deck. "You obviously offended the man. Several times, I might add!"

"Leggoame!" Touma took a swing at him, and missed by a wide mile. Shin rolled his eyes and gathered up the bowl before one of them tripped over it and hurt himself. If they were lucky, they'd make it to the village without any casualties.

~

"See anything yet?" Shu called from the stern. Shin leaned out over the prow of the skiff and squinted against the bloody light of the dying sun. It might have been setting behind them, but the water caught the glare and threw it back, setting the sea aflame. He scanned the coastline with his eyes, looking for the telltale splotch of shadow that would mark a small town or village. A cluster of dark little spikes jutted out into the water. Tied to them were what seemed from a distance to be water beetles floating gently on the surface of the water.

"I can see a harbor! A small one, but it's there. Maybe a half mile more?"

Shu grinned. "Hah! I was right! We should be there before supper."

Shin looked down at the lump of hard-tack in his hand. He'd been nibbling at it for perhaps an hour, and had come to the conclusion that it was actually a rock doing a not-so-successful bread impression. "Thank God. I don't know how much more of this I can stand to eat." He padded barefoot down the deck to perch on the railing beside Shu. "Not that there's much left anyway."

"Who knew the thief was such a bottomless pit?"

"Look who's talking." Shin poked him in the shoulder. 

"That's not funny."

"I think I'll go and get the others," Shin grinned, quickly backing out of the subject. About an hour back, Touma had cautiously poked his head below decks to apologize to Seiji. It had only taken Shin three hours to persuade him to swallow his stubbornness, and another half hour to gather the courage to do so. The silence from the cabin meant that one way or another, peace had been reached. Whether or not the solution involved that sword Seiji carried was open to question.

"Hey, is it safe in there?" Shin called through the door.

"We're both alive, if that's what you mean," Touma's voice seemed slightly flat through the wood. Shin stepped into the cabin to relay the news.

"We'll be docking soon, if we can get permission from whoever the harbormaster is."

Seiji looked up from where he'd been sitting cross-legged on the floor. His sword lay across his knees, naked steel gleaming quietly in the lamplight. He paused in running a whetstone down the blade.

Touma lay sprawled in one of the hammocks, one leg dangling over the edge as he sewed a patch into a ripped length of sailcloth. He glanced upwards, taking his attention away from his work, and promptly jabbed the needle into his finger.

"Be upf's soon's 'm dunf," He mumbled around the injured digit.

"I'll go assist Shu," Seiji sheathed the sword and rose to his feet. Shin turned to Touma after the door had closed.

"What did you say to him?" He asked curiously.

Touma shrugged and folded up the sailcloth. "I apologized, and we got to talking. He's a very...complicated person," He smirked. "At least I found the answer to my question." Shin waited a moment for him to elaborate before realizing he wasn't going to.

"And?"

The thief chuckled and swung himself out of the hammock. He made it to the door before turning around and winking conspiratorially at Shin.

"That, my friend, would be a secret."

~

A rim of crimson outlined in liquid gold was all that remained of the sun by the time the skiff reached the fishing docks. Surprisingly, a cluster of people stood gathered on the piers. Behind them, several mismatched and lopsided homes hunkered down on the cleared area of shore. Typical fishing village, typical setting, so why the crowd?

"What's with the welcoming committee?" Shu wondered as Touma let the sails go slack. Shin leaned over the prow and was troubled to note that most of the faces in the crowd bore angry expressions.

"Permission to dock?" He called out, hoping someone of authority stood within the group.

"You're not Kaegryn," Someone growled.

Looks and shrugs were exchanged between the four on the boat. No one had the slightest idea who they were talking about.

"No, we're not," Touma admitted. "None of us have ever heard of the man."

"That's Kaegryn's craft," Another, feminine, voice shouted. "I'd know it anywhere. He went off to Kichis in it!" Cries of 'thieves' and 'pirates' went up from the other villagers.

Shu made a faint 'urk' noise, and glanced sideways at Shin; it figured, with their luck, that they'd happen to steal a boat belonging to someone of this remote village. Seiji, who had no knowledge of the theft, but noticed their reactions, raised an eyebrow in question. Touma stepped forward, hands raised in pacification, a story already sliding off his tongue.

"I assure you that we did not steal this vessel! Our own ship was lost, wrecked by a Kraken who makes its home at the bottom of the Straits. Only the four of us survived the attack, and found our way to shore." He rapped his knuckles against the railing and continued. "We were fortunate enough to find a boat moored in the shallows, and though we waited nearly two days for the owner to return, no one did." Now the thief shrugged, acting helpless, "So we took the craft and left for our home port."

A ripple ran through the crowd as the people murmured amongst themselves. Shin stared incredulously at Touma before realizing he was probably being watched. He'd never known the other man could spin such tales.

Finally, someone spoke up in a loud, decisive tone. "Fetch the witch, and we'll find out the truth of this!" Shouts of agreement went up, and several people split off from the crowd to head back to the town. The remaining men turned back to the four on the skiff. 

"You, come with us. Pray that you've spoken the truth."

~

"Wonderful, just wonderful," Shu remarked caustically, watching Touma as he paced the confines of the small room they'd been locked inside. "What the hells possessed you to lie like that?!"

"Did you _want_ to be lynched?" Came the snapped reply. "Those people were about ready to drown us all!"

Shin leaned back against the wall and stared up at the ceiling. "Who do you suppose they meant by 'the witch'?"

"Witches are very low level magic-users," Seiji explained quietly from where he sat cross-legged. His sword and Touma's daggers had all been confiscated, leaving them all weaponless. "They're mostly only found in small villages like this one." He didn't seem angry that they hadn't told him about the origins of their craft, but he hadn't spoken a single word to Touma since.

"If you're so upset about being locked up," The thief was growling at Shu, "Why don't you just plow your way through the wall?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" The larger man demanded, reached out to grab a fistful of Touma's shirt.

"Can't even recognize an insult when you hear one?"

"You're coming dangerously close to the bounds of my patience, lightfingers!"

"Enough! Both of you!" Shin shoved Shu back away from Touma and kept his body between them. "This is neither the time, nor the place. Save it."

The door swung open, letting a sudden sharp evening breeze into the room. The young woman in the doorway arched a brow at the scene before her. She wore the same garb as the rest of the villagers; a sharkskin bodice laced tight over a tattered, calf-length dress of homespun cloth, but there the similarities ended. Her feet were bare, but she wore ankle-bracelets of carved bone and shell. Wristbands of leather covered her forearms from wrist to elbow, and bore the marks of several burns and nicks. Her long, kelp-red hair was pullet back into a fillet of mother-of-pearl, and tiny conch shells dangled from her earlobes. The truly strange aspect of her appearance were her nails; small holes had been drilled into the ends, and tiny chains of beaten metal links dangled from them. Equally tiny bells hung from the end of these inches-long chains, chiming to her every movement. A tattoo bearing a stylized dolphin stained pale skin above her left breast, disappearing below the bodice.

"Hardly what I expected to walk in on," She said, her voice tinged with amusement. 

"You are the witch?" Seiji asked calmly, since the other three were still blinking in surprise.

The woman nodded, her earrings swaying with the motion of her head. "I am. My name is Nasuti." She gestured for them to have a seat, and sank bonelessly to the ground, folding her legs beneath her with fluid grace. "Before we begin, I feel I should warn you; my primary talents are divination, and premonition. Therefore, it is useless to lie to me, as I already know the truth of the events which brought you here." A tiny smile curved her lips.

"Then why have you not already turned us over to the people here for punishment?" Seiji asked, seeming somewhat surprised.

Nasuti sighed and tucked a stray lock of hair behind one ear. "Because that would benefit no one. Not you, not this village."

Touma narrowed his eyes and peered suspiciously at the witch. "What exactly are you getting at?"

"This was once a prosperous fishing town," The young woman replied, settling her hands in her lap. "We exported our deep-sea fish to many cities and larger settlements inland." Her stormy green eyes grew troubled, and a line appeared on her brow. "However, a few months ago, our boats began to disappear. Crews went out and were never heard from again. Before long, we became too frightened to venture out of site of the coast, but the source of our troubles came to us instead. A Sea Serpent has made its home in a grotto near here, since we deprived it of its prey on the open seas. Already it has razed this village to the ground twice, causing many, many deaths."

"Sea Serpent?!" Shin gaped. "Those exist?!"

Nasuti nodded. "We sent our headman to discover what it was the Serpent desired, to see if we could somehow make peace, and it laid out its terms. Once a week, we deliver a young person of the village for the creature's consumption. Already we have lost much of the men and women under the age of twenty."

Touma and Shu made noises of disgust and anger, while Shin frowned intensely at the thought. Seiji leaned forward and regarded the witch.

"What does this have to do with us?"

She raised her chin a fraction, and returned his cool gaze. "Four nights ago, I saw all of you in one of my visions. Somehow, you are key to the solution of our problem. If you agree to help us defeat the Serpent, I will see to it that the village council allows you to go free. If not...well, it nears the feeding time, and you all seem to be within the acceptable age limit."

"...You drive a hard bargain, witch," Shu said after a long moment of silence. "What is there to keep us from leaving to kill the monster, and just continue walking?"

"I intend to accompany you," Nasuti replied evenly. "Because it's my duty to protect this place." She leaned forward, mirroring Seiji's posture. "Also, I happen to have information about another foreign traveler that wandered through here a few weeks ago..."

The blonde caught his breath sharply and stared at her. "Who?! What did he look like? Did he leave a name? Or even a destination?"

The witch smiled triumphantly and sat back again. "I'll tell you _after_ the Serpent has been slain."

"You leave us little choice, Lady," Shin said, smiling sardonically. "You certainly _do_ drive a hard bargain."

"Looks like we're with you whether we like it or not," Touma agreed, although he looked none too happy about it.

Nasuti got back to her feet and dusted her skirt off. "I will inform the council of your decision. You'll be shown to more comfortable quarters," She turned to leave, and hesitated. "...And...I thank you. This place is my home, and I can't stand to watch it slowly die."

Touma sighed as the door closed behind her, and looked at his three companions. "You do realize that we're not likely to survive this one, don't you? With the exception of Seiji, none of us are armed, and we can't exactly rely on Shin for Elemental backup just yet. What does she expect us to do?!"

"Damned if I know," Shu scowled at the ground, "But even if she hadn't asked for help, it's just not right to turn our backs on something like this." Shin and Touma both had to nod reluctantly at that. Seiji gazed thoughtfully into empty space, his thoughts chasing themselves in circles. If the man he sought had come through this way, maybe he had left clues as to his eventual destination behind....

The door opened once more as a few men came to escort them to what passed for an inn. All of them carried vicious looking hooks, normally used for catching drifting fishing nets and hauling them in. Agreement or no, they were not trusted. 

"We're going to die one way or another, aren't we?" Shin whispered to Shu, who just stared grimly ahead, remaining silent.

((AN: Ta Da! That didn't take too long. What do you all mean, I'm not using Ryo? How do you know he just hasn't made his appearance yet?! I fully intend to use all the YST characters...at least all the important ones. I think I'll leave the giant floating head out of it, and heaven only knows how I'd be able to incorporate Byakuen...

Like the Nasuti cameo? I'm fond of her, so I'm giving her a fairly large part. ^_^ A girl at my school really DOES have her nails done like that; she happens to be my partner in Home Ec. Fact truly is stranger than fiction, my friends

Many, many thanks to everybody who reviewed *bows repeatedly* 'specially to Ninxa, with her multiple revies, and Risa, with that one BIG ASS one. 0.0 Color me stunned.

Seeing as how this fic seems to have gained a few readers, I feel there are a few things that I, as the author, must confess...

1) Up to this point, I've had every chapter already written out, and I was spacing it along to see how many reviews I could get (because I'm devious and evil and all that other jazz) which explains the fairly regular updates...but now I'm flying blind, none of its written out, and updates will be fewer and farther between. If you want to know why, take a look at my profile and see how many other epics I'm working on. I apologize for that.

2) When I originally started this story, it was with the intention of making it a shounen-ai fic. If that sort of thing disturbs you, you're free to leave. Any implications of that sort of thing are probably going to be extremely subtle until later chapters, and I doubt I'll go into much more than a little PDA. Most likely no lemons.))


	6. It seems these need Titles now

****

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 6

By

Lily of Trust

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Disclaimers: *flips circling lawyers the bird* Oh, sod off.

"Fish," Touma wrinkled his nose at the plate before him, apparently disgusted. "My last breakfast, and it's fish. Have I mentioned my intense dislike of fish?"

Shin and Shu simultaneously kicked him under the table. The thief bit back a howl and reached below to grab at his kneecaps.

"Are you _trying_ to lame me? Why not leave that up to the Serpent?!" Touma growled at them, digging into the meal anyway.

"Whine whine whine...Don't you ever shut up?" Shu asked, finishing his own portion. The four of them were still ensconced within the hut, their meal having been brought to them. So far, no one had made any attempt to release them.

"If you're quite finished?" Nasuti drawled from the doorway. She stood hip-shot, arms crossed over her chest. A familiar sword belt was looped over her torso, and she held a brace of daggers loosely in one hand. "There is still the matter of arming you."

"With what? Fishing poles? Nets? Barbed hooks?" Touma stabbed almost viciously at his plate.

"Surely you don't intend to face the Serpent empty handed?" The witch slung the sword belt off her shoulder and tossed it to Seiji. The daggers she plunked down onto the table before Touma.

"This is all I need," The blonde said, drawing his sword to inspect it critically. By the time the others looked away from the early sun light glittering off the blade, every single dagger had disappeared somewhere onto Touma's person. The thief himself casually mopped his plate with a scrap of breadcrust, ignoring their scrutiny.

"That leaves just the two of you, then," Nasuti turned back towards the door, gesturing over her shoulder towards Shu and Shin. "Follow me."

The two men looked to each other and shrugged, rising to their feet and heading after the redhead.

She lead them towards a low, shed-like structure consisting of four walls, a roof, and a set of double doors latched shut. Nasuti flipped back the latch and swung the doors open, ducking her head to step inside. Morning sunlight fell in solid block into the room, lighting off several sharp, metallic objects.

"Take your pick," The witch waved about her at the numerous spears lining the walls. Normally used during deep sea fishing, for spearing the larger catches, they would be nonetheless deadly in combat. Fortunately, being a docker meant having some experience with punting poles, so the general idea of wielding a staff-like weapon was not unfamiliar to either man.

Shin reached out and experimentally hefted a simple spear, the cross-tree of which hooked in opposite directions on each end, designed to catch and tear as it was pulled free. Nasty, but efficient. Shu, for his part, shrugged and took hold of a simple punting pole, tipped at both ends with a heavy metal. Perhaps steel, perhaps not, but suitable enough for crushing things open.

"Hmm," Nasuti murmured to herself, mouth quirking into an unreadable little smile. "I only hope you know how to use those."

"What about you?" Shin asked, nodding towards her garb, and her weaponless state. 

"My tools are here," She tapped her chest, indicating something inside of her. "And these," She spread her hands wide, flexing her fingers. "I can protect myself."

"If you're certain," Shu seemed unsure, but he knew better than to argue with a witch.

"I am," Nasuti smiled again, and latched the shed shut behind them as they left. "Our provisions are already packed; the grotto is nearly a day's journey away, so we'll need to hurry if we wish to get there before sundown."

~

The bottom rim of the sun had barely lifted clear of the ocean's horizon when the group of five left the village. Quite a crowd had gathered, mostly to see Nasuti off. She had, after all, lived out her entire life in the small town, and had many friends and admirers. A gaggle of younger children clung to her skirts, weeping and wailing and generally making it apparent that most of the villagers didn't expect to see their witch again. She ignored the whispered warnings, busying herself with hugging the children and drying their tears. 

"I promise to return within three days," She said, holding up that many fingers for the benefit of those too young to understand. "One way or another." She gave the child in her lap one last cuddle before shooing them all back to their parents. With a final wave and smile to the other well-wishers, the small party headed deeper inland.

"Was it wise to make a promise you cannot be sure of keeping?" Seiji asked her thoughtfully as they walked. Nasuti shrugged and flicked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. 

"I said 'one way or another'. I believe that even if we fail, my spirit will find its way home. After all, it's not such a very long journey."

The Magi nodded, hesitating for a moment before speaking again. "Not to seem callous...but that does _me_ little good. You are, I'm afraid, my only lead as to the whereabouts of the man I pursue..."

"No offense taken. I knew you were going to say that," The witch smiled.

"Of course you did," Touma said flippantly, "You're psychic, after all."

"You have our permission to turn him into a frog, Lady," Shu muttered, kicking a stone along as they went. Nasuti laughed and shook her head.

"I owe you that much information at least," She said to Seiji, ignoring the continuous banter between the other two. "It isn't much, but I hope you find it helpful.

"Nearly a month ago, two strange men arrived in our village by boat, much as you did. Quite different, they were, in appearance; one as pale as you could imagine, and the other dark in nearly every aspect, even spirit." She paused thoughtfully, pursing her lips, "Personally, I was against boarding them for the night, but they carried hard coin, something we see little of way out here, and the headman accepted them without question. I was only in the same room with them for perhaps an hour, but the pale one kept staring at me in a most discerning manner, so I made a point of avoiding them for the rest of the evening. The following morning, they left, heading East."

"I thought you said you were only chasing after one man?" Shin asked Seiji, "Who's this other person?"

"I'm not certain," The blonde said slowly, eyes narrowing as he wracked his brain. "I have an idea, but I can't know for sure. Lady," He turned back to Nasuti. "I believe one of those men is the one I seek, but I have to ask you a final question to be sure."

"Go on," 

"The pale man you spoke of, he had only one-"

"Eye!" Nasuti nodded enthusiastically. "Yes, he wore a patch." She giggled, eyes sparkling. "One of the children asked if he was a pirate. I used that as my excuse to leave the room and take the girl to bed."

"I doubt he was staring at you for the reason you may think," Seiji chuckled. "He is a very powerful Magi. He probably sensed your talents, and was attempting to assess your level of ability."

"A Magi?!" Nasuti blinked, "But I didn't feel any power from him..."

"He's strong enough to hide the usual signs," Seiji said, once again grim. "Which takes an enormous amount of talent and control."

"If he's so good at this magic crap," Touma piped up "Then what're you going to do when we find the guy?" 

"I'm not sure yet."

"Oh _that's_ reassuring," The thief rolled his eyes. "Don't expect me to stick around for the spat."

"You really _don't_ know when to shut up, do you?" Nasuti shot an acerbic look over her shoulder at him, her brows arching. Touma coughed and fell silent. Shu stared at the witch, jaw hanging open.

"Teach me how to do that!" He begged. "It wasn't magic, was it?"

~

The rest of the trek passed pleasantly enough, in relative silence. The scenery of the coast, while rugged, was absolutely breathtaking. Trees too thick for three men to encircle with their arms stretched upwards for what seemed to be miles. Gnarled branches, heavy with drooping screens of almost cloth-like moss, trapped humidity low to the ground. What little sunlight that managed to filter past the boughs above found itself trapped behind the curtains, shining through the opaque greenery to create an emerald ambience. The ground itself had a tendency to fall away into cliffs that reached straight down to the pounding surf below. The path they followed wound around, sometimes through thick stands of forest and brush, and sometimes right up against the edges of those bluffs. Plumes of sea-spray rose meters into the air before sprinkling back down onto the ocean. On occasion, they were forced to use their weapons to cut back the undergrowth, which grew in wild tangles wherever it damn well pleased. Eventually, the path began to take a downward incline, and moved a little further inland away from the cliffs. The sun had reached its apex and sunk down towards the western horizon by that point, though there were perhaps four hours of daylight left.

"We're nearly there," Nasuti said, her voice breaking into the almost religious hush created by the terrain.

"You've been to its lair before?" shin inquired, looking about himself as though he expected the Serpent to lunge out from the creeping brush.

"I'm familiar with the grotto," Nasuti ducked under a low hanging branch, brushing a dangling beard of fern aside with her arm. "I played there as a child, long before the monster made the place its home." And she would say nothing more.

The entangling mossy webs eventually grew so thick Seiji was forced to take point and hack a path through it. The plant life almost seemed to resist his blade, but had no choice other than to give. Suddenly, the last layer fell away, allowing a column of sunlight to stream into their eyes. The members of the party threw their arms up to shield their faces until they adjusted to the sudden bright light.

Touma was the first to lower his arm, his eyes being more used to sudden changes in intensity. He sucked in a sharp breath, and let it out slowly as he turned to survey the new surroundings.

Sometime long ago, one of the forest giants had fallen, taking its neighbor along with it. The two ancient trees lay in the center of the grotto, partially submerged in a pool of water that seemed to well up from some source deep beneath the ground. Directly across from where they stood, a sheer wall of rock reared up, surrounded on all sides by impenetrable thickets of bracken. The green-gold sunlight reflected off the water of the lagoon, casting ever-shifting patterns onto the rock wall. The water drained off in a series of mini-waterfalls, cascading downwards towards the ocean.

"Incredible..." Seiji said softly, looking about himself with undisguised wonder.

"Isn't it?" Something akin to nostalgia inhabited Nasuti's little smile. She shook head sharply, and cleared her throat to gain their attention. "Let's not forget why we're here, however."

"It doesn't look large enough to hold a Sea Serpent," Shu cocked his head to the side, scrutinizing the pool. 

"It's deep water," Shin pointed out, dipping his spear to indicate the center of the spring, where the clear turquoise melded into cobalt shadows. "I'd guess the snake's been making its home beneath there."

"A very astute guess," Said a deep voice from behind them, "If one is not versed in the ways of Serpents."

A collective yelp rose from the five of them even as they pivoted to face their follower. 

"Who the hell are you?!" Shu demanded, leveling the steel-tipped end of his staff at the strange man. And strange he was; hooded lids drooped over beady black eyes, all of which were thrown into shadow by wild green bangs. There was a strange, almost flat, cast to his face, and the sun seemed to glint off his skin. He leaned casually against a mossy tree trunk, arms crossed loosely over his chest.

"I should be asking _you_ that," He looked them all over, eyes raking them up and down. "Strange, I've never been sent a group offering before. What can that soused excuse for a headman be up to?"

"You! You can't be-" Nasuti took an involuntary step back, raising one hand to her mouth in shock.

"Unless, of course," The man said, circling them as a shark would a school of minnows. "You're not an offering so much as a last ditch attempt for freedom..." If he had eyebrows, which he strangely did not, he might have arched one sardonically. 

Touma made a small flicking motion with his wrist, drawing several daggers from somewhere in his clothes and splaying them out between his fingers. "Well, it's more of a forced-volunteer situation, but yeah, you could say that." 

"Tch, just the four of you and village witch?" The man who claimed to be a serpent stepped backwards until the spring water lapped at his knees. "Not much of a force, is it?" He bared sharply pointed teeth in a grin that widened...and widened...and widened....

His entire body stretched and shifted, legs twisting together into a single column, clothing disappearing into shimmering scales. Popping sounds filled the air as his spine lengthened considerably, shooting him up to nearly six times the height of a normal man. The bones of his face made audible cracking noises as they suddenly surged outward to form a wedge-shaped head. The cold, reptilian grin revealed dozens of long, needle sharp teeth. An identical head sprouted from either shoulder, joining the first in swaying from side to side. A spiny ridge sprung up along the Serpent's back, and scores of small, oscillating fins lined the monster's sides. 

"...That's _disgusting!!!_" Shu and Touma gagged. Shin stared in a sick kind of fascination, head leaned back to stare up at the towering creature. Nasuti had fallen back, her expression a mixture of fear and distate. Seiji took a moment to assess the others, and gripped the hilt of his sword a little tighter. When they'd agreed to exterminate the Serpent, they'd thought it to be some kind of animal, not a monster with the mind of a human.

All three of the Serpent's heads screamed shrilly and lunged forward, their long, flexible necks allowing them to strike at different targets. The party yelped in surprise, reacting swiftly. The closest head snapped at Shu, needle teeth missing his side by a bare inch as he twisted out of range. The heavy end of his staff cracked across the creature's skull, stunning it long enough for him to hit it again, this time ramming the blunt end into one lidless eye. The orb literally burst under the impact, coating the end of the staff in a noxious slime. Keening in pain, the head whipped away, shaking vigorously to dispel the pain. Its remaining eye narrowed, and it darted forward once more, far too quickly for the large man to avoid.

Sunlight glinted brightly off twin projectiles as two of Touma's daggers flickered end-over-end to lodge below the sightless socket. The thief grinned in triumph and fell back a few steps; he knew better than to engage in close range combat armed only with a few knives. The head swung around crazily, half-maddened by agony.

Seiji dealt with the second snake, bringing his blade up between his face and the striking maw. There came a harsh grating sound as steel scraped across bared fangs, and neither yielded. Refusing to retreat so much as a step, the blonde man pursued the head, slashing at the scaled muzzle before him. Hot red blood flew thick on the air, spattering into Seiji's eyes as the attack hit home. The second head also reeled backwards, blood gushing heavily from its injured nose.

Shin held the last snake at bay, watching it warily as it swayed from side to side. Without warning it whipped forward, ivory teeth crashed together only a foot from his face. The spear he'd been carrying stabbed forward seemingly of its own accord, digging deep into the sinuous neck. Shin tore the weapon viciously to the side, slicing through muscle and sinew as he wrenched it back. Blood gouted from the wound, slicking down the moss beside the pool. The Serpent retreated deeper into the water, seeking to put some distance between itself and its attackers, but the four humans pressed forward, having gained a slight upper hand.

Nasuti hung back on the shore, puzzled and not a little stunned. This was almost _easy_. Any of the young men from her village could have done what they were doing, yet her visions had been very adamant that only these four would have succeeded. The Serpent hardly seemed to be putting up a fight! So what...?

She gasped as the monster's ploy finally became obvious. It was slowly drawing its adversaries into deeper water, where footing was unsure, and their advantage of mobility would be neutralized.

"Idiots! Get out of the water!!" She screamed, waving her arms frantically. "It's going to-"

The last part of her warning went unheard as the Serpent lifted its tail from the pool and lashed out at the approaching men. Shin and Touma had been slightly ahead of Seiji and Shu, and were caught across the torso by a scaled column of steely muscle. The blow threw them both back against the rock wall, slamming them against the stone and pinning them there with bone-crushing force. Touma hit the rock first, his cry of pain quickly stifled by Shin being hurled against him.

"Any damage you may cause is superficial," the Serpent sneered, surprising the remaining three. "Stupid, puny mortals...don't you get it yet? You never had a chance! From this high up, you're little more than bugs to be squished at my convenience." It pulled its tail back only to slam Shin and Touma against the rock once more. The convulsing created violent waves that nearly knocked Seiji and Shu off their feet, keeping them from even attempting to aid their friends.

"We're...gonna die..." Touma gasped into Shin's ear, the breath forced from his lungs by the squeezing coil. "Never thought....t'd be...like _this_."

The world was rapidly going red and hazy around the edges as Shin's lungs protested, demanding air, and all he could think was that Touma _didn't_ ever shut up....

The crimson mist vanished, replaced by a blinding white light. Nasuti stepped forward into the battle, blazing from head to toe with mage-energy. Her bare feet touched the water, setting it alight. White flame raced along the surface of the lagoon, twining around the Serpent in shackles of magic. It jerked and twitched spasmodically, fighting against the bonds that held it stationary. No longer was it able to crush its victims, though they were still pinned.

"Hurry!" The witch shouted to the other two. "Binding spells won't last long!"

"What the hell does she expect us to do?!" Shu growled. "We can't get near it with that fire in place!"

"There's no 'we'," Seiji said grimly, reaching out to grab Shu's shoulder, spinning him abruptly around in the water. "Just you." He caught Shu's brow in his free hand, his fingers suddenly sinking _through_ the other man's temples. Shu's mouth fell open in a soundless cry of pain, his entire body convulsing violently. Seiji squeezed his eyes shut, though not before a tear escaped and slid down his cheek. "I'm sorry."

Shu's eyes rolled back in his head, revealing nothing but white. A concussion wave of energy, like the blast of an explosion at ground zero, swept across the grotto. Every stone and boulder within a hundred foot radius suddenly exploded in a shower of rock-dust. The wall of stone Shin and Touma were pinned to was no exception. Cracks snaked along the granite, widening and multiplying until the entire face seemed to be nothing but a spiderweb of crevasses. With a roar of tortured stone, it collapsed inward into a pile of rubble. Sunlight streamed through the newly made gap as Touma stumbled out of the debris and into the water, closely followed by Shin. 

"What the _hell_ did you do to him?!" Shin growled as he reached them, knocking Seiji away from Shu. The dark haired man collapsed into the knee-deep water, completely senseless. Shin frantically checked the pulse at his neck, appearing only slightly relieved when he found it.

"I saved him," Seiji said harshly. "And the both of you."

"_Saved_ him?!" Touma stared incredulously at the blonde as he crouched down beside Shin. "Godsdammit man! You stuck your _hand_ through his _head!_"

"Only because there was no other option," Seiji glanced over his shoulder towards Nasuti, who stood in the shallows, locked in a spell-casting rictus. The blazing white light haloing her body was beginning to flicker and fade. "I swear to you both that I'll explain my actions, but _later!_ There's no time for this now!" He locked eyes with Shin. "Trust me."

Shin stared at him for a long moment, then looked back down at Shu, and finally at Touma, who shook his head. 

"I do," He said at last. "But it had better be a DAMN good explanation!"

The water around them suddenly whipped into a froth. The Serpent writhed violently as the last of the binding flames fell away. Nasuti gave a little cry and fell to her knees by the shore, panting at the effort of such heavy spellcasting. The head Shu had blinded earlier lunged towards the fallen witch, jaw hanging open to rend and tear. Touma shouted in warning and drew the last of his daggers from within his shirt, splaying them between his fingers to hurl. He winced in pain as he put all his strength behind the throw, breathing a soft prayer to any handy deity. They thudded home behind the jaw, jerking the snake slightly off course. The fangs that would have taken a large chunk out of Nasuti's side only grazed her shoulder instead. She screamed in fear and pushed away from the monstrous face, blood running down her arm as she staggered to her feet and scrambled away. 

The head never even had a chance to give chase; there came a high whistling noise as the blade of Seiji's sword swung downwards at an incredible speed, cleaving right through the bone and muscle. The severed head thunked to the ground, leaving the neck to whip around like an out of control hose. Blood fountained from the severed jugular, raining down upon the grotto. The two remaining heads looked at each other for a moment, blinking in almost comical surprise before resuming their attack, focussing now on Seiji.

"Oh that was brilliant Seiji, _piss_ it off!" Touma growled. He could do nothing more but watch as the swordsman defended himself against the two heads. His weapons were gone, and there was no way he would attack either of those things with his bare hands. The fight was shaping up to be distinctly one-sided. The head the blonde had injured earlier broke through his guard and sank its teeth into his thigh, then jerked backwards, taking a large amount of flesh with it. Seiji screamed and sank down to one knee, clutching futilely at the ragged wound. 

"They'll kill him!" Shin cried, lurching to his feet. He had lost his own weapon when he'd been thrown against the rock wall, but unlike Touma, he still had something with which to fight. "Seiji!"

The water in all directions rippled and shimmered as frost pearled the surface. Touma stared down at rapidly forming ice around his legs, and grabbed Shu under the arms to pull him to the bank before they were both trapped. Shin clenched his hands into fists and howled as the power beat loose from his body, crashing waves of ice against the Serpent. The intense cold slowed the monster down, leaving it unable to fight as the ice crept up its body. Seiji levered himself back to his feet, using his sword as a crutch, and held a hand out, palm facing towards the Serpent. Swirling energies of green and gold gathered against his skin, slowly growing brighter and stronger as he concentrated past the pain. The chill in the air faded, leaving the monster frozen within a small hill of ice. Seiji spread his fingers wide and the blast of power left his hand, slamming into the mound and shattering it, and the creature inside into millions of tiny shards.

Silence nearly as deafening as the explosion fell. Seiji collapsed to the ground, gritting his teeth against the pain in his leg. He felt lightheaded and strangely disassociated...he supposed the Serpent had managed to sever the major artery.

A light touch pushed away the blood-soaked edges of his clothing, searching out the seriousness of the wound. Seiji cracked an eye open and stared blearily up at Nasuti, who held her hands above the injury and murmured softly under her breath. 

"What...?" He panted out.

"I have a minor healing talent...I can barely stop the bleeding, but it will have to hold until we can get you to real help," She said, the shaky tone of her voice saying louder than words how serious it really was. She tore a strip from the hem of her skirt and deftly bandaged the wound, using nearby clumps of moss and fern as a makeshift poultice to staunch the bleeding.

There came a faint splashing noise off to the right, and Touma and Shin appeared in his line of sight, supporting a still unconscious Shu between them. Both of them were walking awkwardly, suggesting they had bruised several ribs during the skirmish. Shin dropped to his knees beside Nasuti, leaving Touma to settle Shu back against a nearby tree trunk.

"How bad?" He asked quietly.

The witch shook her head and bit her lip. "I don't know...bad....very bad...possibly fatal?"

"Should you be saying that right in front of him?" Touma said wryly, his usual casual tone barely masking the fear in his voice.

"Relax, all of you," Seiji said, dropping a hand down over the bite marks. "Accelerated healing is part of being a Magi. My body will be fine with what the Lady has done."

"Still, you shouldn't be moved until the healing process is complete," Nasuti decided. "The same goes for the rest of you. Stay here, I'll see if I can find where I dropped my pack." She got to her feet and dusted off her skirt, then turned and backtracked the way they'd come. Touma frowned and stood to follow her, thinking that she seemed a little unsteady on her feet. 

Shin watched until they were out of sight before reaching over to help Seiji sit up. The blonde man grunted and grabbed hold of the hilt of his sword, which lay nearby. He bent his attention to cleaning the gore and grime off the blade with another handful of the dry moss, keeping his eyes averted from those of his protege. 

"Seiji?" Shin sat back on his heels and watched. "What did you do? I need to know."

"I did what I thought to be best," Seiji said slowly. "I'm sorry if I hurt him."

"Now you're avoiding the question," Shin glared at him, a look promising much in the way of torment. "That blast...it didn't come from you, did it? It came from him. I felt it. But Shu's not...." Shin trailed off, frowning in confusion. "Is he?"

Seiji sighed and sheathed his sword, turning to look at the unconscious man. "You were not the only Elemental I sensed when I joined you. You were the only _awakened_ one, yes, but not the sole one. Shu possessed, or, I should say, possesses, an extremely latent Elemental ability. If I had not deliberately jolted it awake, he quite possibly would have gone through life without ever knowing."

"He's an....Elemental...too?" Shin echoed faintly, eyes distant as he stared at his hands in his lap. They suddenly clenched as he raised angry, blazing eyes to Seiji's. "_You had no right!_"

"I-" The blonde began to say, but was abruptly cut off as Shin's fist slammed into his jaw. His vision rocked and swam before settling back to normal, only to find it filled by a pair of enraged green eyes.

"Do you know what you've done?" Shin growled, tightening one hand in the front of Seiji's shirt and hauling him up. "Do you have any idea what they _do_ to Elementals here?! They drain them of their life force, and feed it into a comatose Royal. I've heard it's a very slow, painful process. If, no, _when,_ we're caught, he won't be let go. Before, at least there was a possibility! You had no right to take away his chance to be normal!"

"Are you angry over his loss, or yours?" Seiji asked coolly, apparently unperturbed by the vehemence in the smaller man's voice. "We don't choose to be what we are Shin, we just live with it as best we can. No one enjoys being different; it means pain and suffering, being pushed away from everyone else. But a normal person can't do the things we can. A normal person wouldn't have survived today. It's thanks to him that you're still around to be irritated with me," He paused to rub briefly at the darkening bruise on his jaw. "Although I could have done without the right hook."

Shin released his grip on Seiji's shirt and sank back, shoulders slumping as the misplaced anger drained out of him. He shook his head and stared listlessly at the ground.

"I...I'm sorry....I just don't know anymore...don't know anything."

A hand settled over his shoulder, squeezing gently. Shin looked up and was surprised to find that Seiji was smiling at him. A small one, yes, but a smile nonetheless.

"Don't try to make sense of it. It's not possible, and you'll give yourself a migraine in the attempt."

The corner of Shin's mouth twitched upwards in a half-hearted smile. "What now?"

"Now? Now we rest, and recover, and possibly keep heading forward." Seiji said, settling himself back against the tree. "I'd like to follow this lead, and see where it takes me, if that's alright with the rest of you."

"We haven't got anywhere else to be," Shin shrugged. "Anything that takes us further away from Kichis is a good plan. Hells, maybe it'll even get us out of Taidem."

"Incoming all! We found the packs!" Touma called out, rounding the bend and waving one knapsack aloft. He took in the scene with a blink, and quirked an eyebrow. "What did I miss?"

"Mm, nothing," Seiji dismissed him with a wave of his hand, allowing his eyes to fall shut as he leaned back against the tree.

"Sure. Then I'm going to guess you got clipped by a ricocheting ice fragment or something, since you didn't have that bruise when we left." The thief snorted as he dumped the pack down beside them. Nasuti appeared then, cutting off the conversation. She rummaged through the sack she carried, beaming in triumph as she came up with a few packets of rations. 

"Somebody get a fire started, and I'll see about dinner. Maybe that'll bring your friend back." She nodded towards Shu and pulled out an aide-kit for a cleaner bandage for Seiji's leg. Touma shrugged and moved off to find something to use for firewood that hadn't been soaked during the clash. 

"By the way...." Nasuti said, just before he left. She looked up at them through the fringe of her bangs, seeming very shy. "I can't thank you enough for what you've done...."

"We'd be Serpent-supper if it hadn't been for you, Lady," Touma shrugged. 

"...I wouldn't have put it quite in those words, but he is right," Seiji agreed.

"Thank us with supper," Shin suggested, smiling at her "I don't think any of us could make that trail stuff edible."

Nasuti laughed and nodded. Within short order they had put dinner together, and were arguing over how soon they would be able to move the wounded. With any luck, the travelers would be on their way again before the week was out, following nothing but a faint, rapidly cooling trail.

(AN: Aaand so concludes the fight scene ^-^ I'll just be leaving before someone decides to take me to task for delaying chapters...*attempts to flee and is hit upside the head by Risa's thesaurus* @.@ Okay...I'm sorry about the deception. I hope this sort of makes up for it. 

I really, really appreciate all the reviews I got this time around!! *is dancing* The cast members are all in traction, or they'd be up here with me, doing a little jig at the attention. Well...maybe I could talk Shu into it, but I think the others would tell me to take the idea and shove it somewhere anatomically impossible.

Tala, thank you for being polite about you point of view, and for the positive part of it. So many people go "OMG! U MADE THEM KISS!! THATS SIC! WHATS WRONG W/U?!" (Note that it's not the yelling that bothers me so much as the horrible grammar and abbreviations -.-) To anyone else out there bothered by the upcoming shounen-ai content, leave now. This was most likely the last, I repeat, LAST chapter with normal contact. 

Gotta run now! I promised my friend I'd work on one of my other stories *waves* The next chapter will be up as soon as I can handle it)


	7. Chapter 7, Part A

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 7

(part A)

By

Lily of Trust

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Disclaimers: Not mine. Damn. Steal the idea and I come after you with a blunt object.

Two days of R&R (rest and i_recuperation/i_) found the four young men at sea once again. The party's return to the village had been created with shock, incredulity, and no little hysterical relief. Now free of the Serpent's threat, the fishing boats had ventured into deep-water to trawl, returning with an enormous catch. The villagers threw a huge celebration that lasted through that night and the next. For one reason or another, none of the five who had fought the creature chose to participate. Seiji, Nasuti and Shin suffered from severe energy burn-out, not to mention their physical injuries, and mostly sat off to side and watched the festivities. Shu still nursed a monstrous headache, which bright lights and loud noises only aggravated. He knew better than to add a hangover to the mix. Seiji took the opportunity to fill the larger man in on his newly awakened talents, and confessed to deliberately shocking them awake. After a few moments of thoughtful silence, Shu admitted that it had been for the best, and he didn't blame the Magi for what he had done. 

Touma surprised all three of his companions by choosing to forego the party. Aside from a few bruised ribs, he was in remarkably good shape, and yet he avoided the music, laughter, and liquor like the plague. Why exactly that was, none of the other men thought to ask. 

They set out to sea as soon as they were well enough to make the journey. Nasuti personally saw to both the healing of their wounds and the replenishing of their supplies. Though she never asked them to prolong their stay, her eyes and voice held a certain sadness at the leaving. 

"Just remember," She said as she stood on the dock in the pre-dawn mist, watching as Shin adjusted the sails and Shu carefully undid the heavy knots that moored the skiff to the pier. "This place still owes you a large debt. A boat and a little food is hardly thanks enough for what you've done. If you're ever in the vicinity again, and in need of help, please don't hesitate to come to us."

"We'll keep that in mind Lady," Shin smiled. The sails unfurled with a sharp crack of wind on oiled canvas, straining outward along with the breeze. "Although I don't think we'll be heading back this way any time soon."

"Oh, we'll meet again," Nasuti chuckled, a knowing quirk to her lips. "I've seen it."

"If you say so," Touma stifled a yawn and waved to the witch. "Take care of yourself."

The woman's waving silhouette faded into the fog, just as the first muffled sounds of the village waking drifted on the salt laden air. 

For a time, no one felt the need to speak. Seiji leaned against the port-side railing and watched the glassy black water slide away from the side of the craft. Shin joined Shu at the tiller, scrutinizing a map of the coastline Nasuti had added to their gear. Touma yawned again and leaned back against the cabin building, obviously struggling to remain awake.

"The fog should burn off after sunrise," Shin said quietly, his voice muffled by the thick mists. "We'll stick to the coast 'til then, and find get our bearings once the visibility's improved."

"Sounds like a plan to me," Touma agreed. "You won't be needing me, will you? I'd really like to catch a little more sleep before sun-up."

"I think we can handle navigating without you," Seiji spoke up, "The same goes for you, Shu. Your mind hasn't recovered from the power backlash as yet."

Shu cracked a sheepish smile and rubbed the back of his neck. "I wasn't going to say anything if you needed me here...but my aching head would appreciate the break." 

"Go ahead," The blonde assured him. "The real headache begins after you've recuperated."

Shin groaned. "Oh for the love of...you aren't actually going to put him through that training routine so soon are you?!"

"Newly Awakened, it will most likely be easier for him to handle than it was for you, as you were aware of your talents for years."

By that point, Touma and Shu had retreated to the cabin, stifling yawns as they went.

The morning wore on, long past the point where the rising sun should have scorched away the fog. The blanketing mists seemed to grow thicker and more opaque, if anything. Shin fidgeted uneasily at the tiller, wondering why he felt so edgy. It wasn't just the fog, although that on its own made conditions dangerous for sailing, but rather there was something out there that set his nerves on edge. Or maybe a lack of something...

That thought triggered a realization. For some time now, he hadn't heard the familiar sound of waves slapping against the rock of the coastline. Sometime during the hours, they had drifted farther off course and out to sea!

"Seiji!" He called, hurrying towards the prow of the boat. "We have to drop anchor now! It's too hazardous to continue on. We may already be completely lost."

"I had a feeling this would happen," The Magi sighed as they went to lower the heavy iron anchor. "You're the sailor; do we have any chance of regaining our previous route?"

"I think it's likely. I doubt we've been drifting for too long-" Shin paused in wrestling with the barnacle encrusted chain and looked up out into the fog. He frowned absently, his head tilting to the side a fraction. Seiji noticed his sudden shift in attention, and glanced upwards, following his line of sight.

"What do you hear?" He breathed softly, recognizing the sudden taught look to Shin's stance as a listening posture.

"...Creaking...like rope and wood...but it's wrong somehow..." The smaller man leaned forward to better hear the faint strains of sound. "I would say another ship, but it's missing all the other noises..."

Something huge and dark suddenly loomed up out of the fog. Both men caught a brief glimpse of an immense wall made up of varying shades of black and brown, before the skiff crashed into the behemoth. 

The impact sent both of them careening wildly. Seiji slammed into the corner of the cabin, the back of his head cracking dangerously loud against the wood. Shin had the sense to tuck himself into a ball, and found himself sprawled across Seiji's lap, blinking stars from his eyes. His right shoulder ached fiercely, evidence that he had banged it up or rolled on it wrong during the collision. Realizing where exactly he had landed, he pushed himself up and turned to get a better look at Seiji. The blonde man seemed to be only semi-conscious. His eyes were halfway open, but blurred and faraway. 

"Are you hurt?" Shin asked somewhat breathlessly, struggling to suck air into his battered lungs.

"Just a bump," Seiji replied dazedly. He reached up to touch the back of his head, wincing and pulling it away as his fingers brushed over a tender lump. He brought the hand up before his face, regarding it with bemused surprise. Dark crimson stained pale skin, trickling down the back of his fingers and wrist.

Shin was vaguely aware of noises from the cabin below as he stared in horror at the blood. He took Seiji by the shoulders and carefully leaned him away from the wall. Vivid ruby matted together clumps of gold, making a mess of the back of the Magi's head. It probably looked worse than it really was; head wounds always bled more freely than others. What truly concerned Shin was the extremely likely possibility of a concussion. 

"What the hell's going on up here?!" Touma's sleepy, but nonetheless irritated, voice came as he reached the top of the steps. "You ran us aground, didn't you?!"

"We're nowhere near the shore," Shin looked up and glared at him. "We've drifted in the fog. To be honest, I don't know i_what/i_ we hit."

Shu fingered the dent Seiji's skull had left in the wood, and grimaced. "Speaking of hit...we'd better bind that wound."

Touma took one look at the blood and blanched. "Right. You two do that. I'll see how badly the skiff's damaged."

"Blood didn't seem to bother you before," Shu said as he headed back into the cabin to retrieve an aid kit.

"That was during a fight. Things tend to get messy with blades and blunt objects flying around. It's the every day stuff that turns my stomach," The thief said shortly, padding towards the prow, now a tangle of jagged spars of wood. He picked his way around splinters, wishing he'd thought to put something on his feet. 

The front end of the little craft had slammed head-on into a much, much larger ship. Touma frowned and leaned over the small gap of empty space between the boat and the obstacle, and pressed his hand against it. Barnacles the size of his fist encrusted the algae-slimed planks. He might not have known much about things nautical, but he was fairly certain that one didn't allow things like that to grow on the hull. Touma tilted his head back and peered up through the fog. Above, tattered sails snapped and billowed, though the air was utterly still. From somewhere within the ship came the groaning of aged wood, echoing on and on. 

His eyes caught on a faint flash of color. Touma leaned precariously over the starboard railing, noticing scrolling words painted onto the wood in flaking gilt. As best he could tell, it read:

VA-S--R

He nearly overbalanced and fell into the ocean. As it was, Touma let out a shocked squawk, teetered dangerously for a moment or two, and finally plopped onto his backside on the deck. 

Shin looked up from winding the strip of linen around Seiji's head as Touma tore back towards them. He blinked in surprise at the expression of near-panic on the thief's face.

"What, what is it?!" He demanded. 

"W-we hit..." The blue-haired man had gone ghostly pale, seeming like nothing more than a wraith against the fog. "The V-Vassaar."

"The i_what?!/i_" Shin dropped the roll of bandage, "That's not possible! It's a legend, a myth!"

"Apparently not," Touma said dryly, recovering his composure. 

"What's a 'Vassaar'?" Seiji asked, his voice a little steadier than it had been. His eyes still slid in and out of focus, but he remained coherent enough to follow their conversation.

"A ghost ship," Touma told him, voice deepening ominously. "Supposedly, hundreds of years ago, coastal villages were terrorized by a fleet of pirates, lead by the black warship Malacaster. The Royal Navy's attempts to stop them were crushed, so the King, in a fit of desperation, enlisted the help of a Marauder Captain and his ship, the Vassaar, promising him a fortune if he could solve the problem. The man agreed, and hunted down the leader of the pirates. There followed a high seas naval battle that could be heard for miles around. No one's sure who won, for both ships disappeared into thin air. The rest of the pirate fleet, now leaderless, disbanded."

"Legend has it that both the Malacaster and the Vassaar drift forever as ghost ships," Shin finished for him, tying off the bandage. "I always thought that the story was just that....but now?"

"A ghost ship, especially one so ancient, should not be solid enough to crash into," Seiji pointed out, adjusting the wrap.

Touma ignored him. "This bodes ill. I wonder what becomes of boats that encounter ghost ships?"

"I hate to be the bearer of even worse news," Shu said, emerging onto the deck. His trousers were soaked from the knee down, and dripped as he walked. "But we seem to be sinking."

Shin and Touma stared at him for a moment, then looked to each other. 

"Options?" Shu asked, leaning against the cabin.

"...The way I see it, we've got two choices," Touma said slowly. "We can either jump overboard and swim for shore,"

"But we don't know which way shore i_is/i_," Shin argued.

"i_OR_,/i" Touma continued as though he hadn't been interrupted. "We can climb aboard the Vassaar and wait for the fog to lift."

"Not much of a choice, is it?" Shin stood and headed towards the cabin. "I'll salvage what I can. Touma, do you think you can scale the side of the ship and lower down a rope or something for the rest of us?"

"You're talking to the best second story man in Kichis," Touma nodded, quickly sorting through the debris littering the deck for a length of rope. "How do you propose to get i_him/i_ up the rope?" He jerked a thumb towards Seiji. The Magi sat with his head in his hands, breaths coming shallow and erratic.

"I can carry him, or hoist him up," Shu offered. "He's tall, but he doesn't look like he weighs much."

"Good, stay with him and keep him awake. I really don't like the look of that lump...he might have a concussion," Shin advised before vanishing below decks. Touma coiled up the rope and shouldered it. He and Shu exchanged a grave nod before he turned and headed towards the collision site.

The huge, curving side of the Vassaar was slick with algae and rot. Fortunately, centuries of drifting as sea had contributed to the growth of fist-sized barnacles. The shelly lumps provided him with convenient hand and foot-holds. He'd had harder climbs up the side of tenement buildings. 

Hand-over-hand, Touma swarmed up towards the railing, which was gradually coming into view. In short order, he pulled himself up over the decaying beam of wood, making a disgusted face as part of it crumbled into a spongy blackish mess in the palm of his hand. He dropped the rope to the planks underfoot, and looked about himself. The main deck stretched before him for about fifty feet, and away to either side for perhaps a hundred. There had once been three main masts, but two of them had broken away, leaving jagged stubs poking up out of the deck itself. Only the center one remained, trailing bits of rigging like lank strands of hair. Touma tilted his head back and tried to make out the crow's nest, but the mists were too concealing. He could just discern the outline of the Captain's cabin to his left, though it, too, was mostly obscured by fog. Eerily enough, there was a faint pearlescent gleam to the mist. Touma shivered and turned away from it.

His curiosity was i_begging/i_ for the chance to look around, but at the moment he was more concerned with finding something to secure the rope to. An empty iron lantern bracket, mostly rusted through but still sound, protruded from one of the on-deck cabins. He swiftly looped the rope around it and tied a secure knot as tightly as he could manage. 

"Shu! Are you down there?" He hollered over the side of the ship. From below came a muffled response. "Heads up!" Touma tossed the free end of the rope down towards the skiff. It hung in the air for a moment before gravity pulled it down, the resistance of the air causing it to slither and hiss as it fell out of sight. The length of it hung slack for a moment before suddenly springing taut. It shuddered slightly as Shu climbed hand-over-hand up the Vassaar. Touma caught hold of the rope and leaned back, adding his own weight to the effort.

In a few moments, a hand grasped at the crumbling railing. There came a noise of distaste, and Shu's head and shoulders came into view. Seiji was slung over his shoulder, still only semi-conscious. Touma reached over and grabbed Shu by the shoulder, helping him the rest of the way up. 

"Tough climb?" He asked as the other man settled Seiji back against the cabin. Shu nodded and turned to look back down at the rapidly sinking boat.

"Shin's still down there. He was salvaging as much of our supplies as he could when I left."

The rope gave a sudden jerk, catching their attention. Shin's voice came faintly from below.

"I'm tying the packs on! Pull it up and then toss the rope back down to me!"

"Are you alright down there?" Touma shouted as Shu began to pull the line up, grunting in surprise at the weight.

"I'm up to my knees in saltwater. Wait much longer and I'll be treading it."

"Point taken," Touma took a step back as three packs clunked down onto the deck near Shu's feet. He quickly undid the professional knots Shin had tied and threw the rope back over the side. "Grab ahold!"

There came a faint splashing noise before the line gave a quiver. Shu took a deep breath, bunched his shoulders up, and gave a mighty haul on the rope. A muffled yelp and a "Whoa, wait!" could be heard as he quickly pulled it in. A few moments later Shin scrambled over the edge, glaring at his friend as he unwound the hemp from his wrist.

"You nearly wrenched my arm out of its socket," He said flatly. Shu frowned in concern at the red marks scoring the younger man's wrist, struck by a sudden pang of deja-vu. 

"That was much easier than it should have been," He replied finally, "You don't weigh nearly enough."

"I'm fine," Shin said, standing and looking around. An involuntary shiver clawed its way up his spine. He couldn't have imagined a more perfect setting for a 'ghost ship'.

"Well," Touma said, almost as though he had read Shin's mind. "At least the 'ghost' part of the legend seems to be false." He reached into his pocket and withdrew the now-familiar worry stone.

"Yeah, seems to be," Shu crossed his arms over his chest and leaned sideways against the railing, watching as the mast of their skiff disappeared beneath the waves. "But how long are we going to be stuck on this barge? For all we know, it could be drifting further out to sea. By the time the fog lifts, we could be even more lost than we are now!"  
"It's better than drowning," Shin reminded him, kneeling by Seiji to check the dressing. The Magi stirred, a little more sense coming into his eyes as he blinked owlishly up at him.

"Something...about this place...." He said slowly "Feels...wrong."

"Whatever it is, we can survive it for a few hours," Shu assured him, spreading his hands to indicate the ship. "There's no need to worry so mu-i_Unnh!/i_" He staggered suddenly, and looked downward to stare at the curved tip of a cutlass protruding from his side. The other three followed his gaze, blinking in horrified fascination. No blood flowed from the wound, and the blade itself seemed to be transparent. Shu gritted his teeth and hissed softly as a wave of deathly cold swept through his chest, like a glacier's lifeblood flowing through his veins. 

"Shu, behind you!" Shin cried, looking up from the phantom sword at the spectral figure standing behind the big man. Clad in a corsair's tattered finery, bangles and bracelets adorned his arms, and large hoops hung from his earlobes. Pits of flickering black flame occupied the eye sockets in a lean, hungry looking face.

Touma recovered before the rest. He reached towards their packs, grasping the protruding hilt of Seiji's sword and drawing it from its sheath within. The corsair yanked his cutlass loose from Shu's side and moved to face the thief. He brought it down over his head in a vicious slash, and Touma raised the Magi's blade to block the strike. To the surprise of Shin and Shu, the ghost-sword actually connected with the real one, sending sparks of multicolored fire flaring on the dim air. Touma stepped to the side, knocking away the cutlass, and ran the pirate through with a thrust that looked almost practiced. A look of shock spread over the ghost's face; it fell back a few steps, its image wavering unsteadily for a moment before vanishing.

"...What the HELL?!" Shin stared incredulously at Touma, who returned the sword to its scabbard and shrugged.

"I figured if it had belonged to a Magi for so long, it might actually be some good against ghostly weapons," He explained. Seiji nodded carefully in approval at his logic, and then looked to Shu, who was carefully feeling over the non-wound in his side.

"Phantom weapons can only do you true harm if you believe they exist," He said, his voice still a little unsteady. "Leave it alone. Your body is fine. Your mind merely thinks you should be hurt."

"You talk too much for an injured man," Shu muttered, casting furtive glances about him. "If this ship really _is_ haunted, we can't stay here!"

"What do you propose we do? Jump overboard and strike out for shore?" Touma asked sardonically. "In case you've forgotten, some of us i_can't/i_ swim!" He jerked a thumb to his chest and gestured towards Seiji with his free hand.

"We can't exactly stay either," Shin frowned, setting his back against the reassuringly real wood of the cabin. "Not if that was an example of what's to be found here."

"It didn't hurt us, so where's the harm?" Touma shrugged.

"The harm is that by staying too long in this surreal environment, we will eventually lose our grip on reality, and become much like those spirits," Seiji spoke up. "I have a feeling that the fog will not lift. I think it travels around the ship itself."

"It is a little strange that the weather shifted when it did," Shin said thoughtfully, "But what makes you so sure?"

"I can feel a cloud of magic hovering over this place, the remnants of a very powerful spellcasting," The Magi lifted his head to look at his student, though the effort seemed to be almost too much for him. "Very foul magic. It is that more than anything which keeps me off my feet."

"Alright, let's assume this is all the result of some spell," Touma hopped up onto the railing and perched there, looking over the other three. "How do we put a stop to it and get back to the real world?"

"A spell could not survive for as long as your legends say this ghost-ship has roamed without some sort of physical anchor," Seiji frowned, pinching the bridge of his nose to ward off the ache in the back of his head. "We must find it and destroy it."

"Fighting our way through a horde of ghosts?!" Shu touched a hand to his side and scowled. "And the longer we're here, I'm guessing the more damage they'll be able to do to us."

"You're more perceptive than I gave you credit for," Seiji nodded.

"That means 'yes'." Touma translated, hopping off the railing and scooping up one of the packs. "I think the best place to start looking would be the Captain's cabin." 

Shu followed his example, grabbing up the other two knapsacks. Shin pulled one of Seiji's arms around his shoulders and helped the blonde man to his feet. They both staggered a little, but managed to walk despite the strange distribution of weight.

"I'm sorry," Seiji murmured into Shin's ear, "For being such a burden when you least need one."

"You're no burden," The slight young man replied with forced lightness. "You were injured on accident, it's not your fault." He tightened his arm around taller man's waist as he slipped a little, his head settling onto Shin's shoulder. "But it'd be easier if you could walk on your own."

"It's the spell..." Seiji screwed his eyes shut and turned his face into Shin's neck, as though trying to escape some noxious odor or vision. "We must be getting closer, for it to affect me so."

By that point, they were nearing the middle mast, the center point of the ship. The boards beneath their feet groaned ominously with every step, threatening to give way after centuries of rot. The outlines of the Captain's quarters were gradually becoming more defined as the fog fell away before their eyes.

"I wonder where our ghostly friends got to?" Touma looked about himself as he toyed nervously with his worry-stone. "It seems strange that we should only meet i_one/i_." 

"I think 'lucky' would be the better word," Shu grumbled, unable to shake the goosebumps crawling up his arms. The fierce cold that had entered his body from the phantom wound didn't seem to be dissipating. Instead, the chill almost felt as though it was spreading up towards his shoulder. "Would you just put that rock away? You're starting to annoy me."

Touma opened his mouth for a retort that never came. The air around them began to waver and shimmer, as though they were trapped within a heat mirage. The fog melted away, replaced by the scorching high-noon sun. The light seemed to bring changes to the Vassaar; the two missing masts suddenly came into view, once again whole and sound. The rigging reattached itself to the posts and sails. The holes gaping in the deck closed up, the wood looking once again well used, but lacking of decay. 

"What in-?" Shu started to ask, but was suddenly drowned out by a mass roar of human voices. People appeared all around them, big as life and twice as real. Corsairs in their wild, clashing colors, and pirates in their more drab, worn clothing, clashed over swords, hooks, maces, and wickedly curved daggers. They hacked and slashed at one another, heedless of damage or death. Blood spurted from rent wounds, spattering onto the deck and making the footing treacherous. More men in pirate garb swarmed up over the side of the ship, their weapons held between clenched teeth. Combatants went down screaming on all sides, but strangely enough, none of them seemed to take any notice of the four bewildered men in their midst.

"What's going on?!" Shin shouted over the din. One of the corsairs near him stumbled backwards, pierced through the throat by a thrown dagger. The dying man fell right through him, still clutching at the hideous wound as though he could hold the spraying blood in by will alone. Shin gasped in shock as all the heat seemed to leak right out of his body, the breath snatched from his lungs by the chill. His knees buckled, the combined burden of both his own weight and Seiji's pulling him downward towards the ghost puddled around his feet.

Then both Touma and Shu were there. The thief grabbed hold of Shin and hauled him back to his feet, while Shu kept Seiji standing. Touma ducked a wild swing from another phantom and looked to the other three.

"I think we're reliving the Vassaar's last battle!" He yelled. "It's some part of the spell, look!" He nodded towards their goal, the Captain's cabin. It alone remained untouched by the transformation that had overtaken the ship; it still hunkered down in shadow, crumbling and desolate. "If we can reach it, we should be able to escape this madness!"

"Then let's hurry!" Shu said grimly. "Get out that sword Touma; if running through these ghosts does _that_" He nodded towards Shin, "Then we can't take that chance."

Touma nodded once and drew the weapon from the pack he carried. It took on a glow of its own, brighter than the sham sunlight that lit up the air around them. Still the specters took no notice, too caught up in the battle they had been fighting endlessly for centuries. Shin stepped away from the blue haired thief, still shaking all over, but determined to make the run. 

There came a lull in the fighting; a brief glimpse of an open space between them and the cabin. Half stumbling, half running, they broke through the violently struggling crowd. They reached the cabin door, but couldn't take the time to stop and open it, so Shu threw his weight behind his free shoulder and slammed through the wood. It swung open with minimal resistance, sending him lurching into the room as his momentum carried him onward. Touma, still supporting Shin, broke through a half second later. He pushed the dazed young man against the wall, whirled around and slammed the door shut behind him. He leaned his bead back against the fungi-moist wood and panted for breath.

"Interesting," Came a deep, wryly amused voice, "No one's ever managed to make it past the Ghosts' Battle. I wonder then, what kind of men you are to withstand the chilling touch of phantom flesh."

((AN: Eh heh...hey. I know I really took my time with this one, and I really don't have any excuses other than the death of my inspiration. It's rotting under my bed somewhere.

I only meant for the whole ghost-ship thing to take a chapter, but like so many other things, it seems to have run away with me, so I'm splitting this into two parts. The second should be much, much shorter than this. I couldn't continue without turning this into a fifteen page chapter, and NOBODY has time to sit down and read that all in one go. So why put this up? Partly to motivate myself into working some more (review, reveiw!) and partly to prove that I haven't shoved this fic off into some dusty corner. Really, I haven't! Here's to hoping that Khisanth meant it when she said she could wait for chapters like these ^_^;; Eh heh...

Oh dear Lord! Risa was bad enough, but now Angel's getting involved!!! *buckles on her crash helmet* I'm REALLY SORRY this took so long! I am I am! Don't hurt me!!!! Note to self: Make Risa cry...Sadly, Nasuti has ended her cameo. She's needed where she is, but I may bring her back in later, as it suits me. Next on the Cameo list is....No, I'm not telling. ^_^ I'm glad their personalities are turning out so realistically. They're always...interesting to write for. Screw the canon, this is more fun! You can't hurt me with that thing Angel, I know too much ^^ The whole Duo affair for instance....Mwah!

Woo hah! I'm going to corrupt Ninxa to the Yaoi side! Well, maybe not quite, but at least I can 'build up her tolerance' for it. *rubs her hands together and cackles diabolically* OH! I meant to give Shadow of a Rose credit last time for figuring out who the Serpent would be, but it totally slipped my mind! b^_^d Two thumbs up to you! Many thanks to Robin Gurl for THREE reviews...wow, did my count ever go up. 

Kar-chan...perhaps you ought to catch some more sleep o.O That can't be healthy...And as for Ryo, Reona and MaryD *grins* You'll have to see. He isn't coming in for quite a while, but I bet you can figure out what I'm gonna do with him. ~_^

MAJOR kudos to Ruby (and almost every RPG I've ever played on PS ^_^;; ) For the ghost-ship idea. *TackleGlomps Ruby* You majorly saved my arse, even if your suggestions for shounen ai action were a little...weeeelll.... She also drew me this AMAZING picture of Naaza-as-Sea-Serpent, but since I don't have anywhere to link it from, I can't show you guys!! Ruby, let them see it!

And that's my long list of thanks. Did I forget anyone? Lordee I hope not...))


	8. Chapter 7, Part B should have just made ...

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 7

(part B)

By

Lily of Trust

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Disclaimer: Are you even ALLOWED to sue minors? I don't think so....

Touma pushed off the door and spun around, kicking up little puffs of dust and disintegrated cobwebs. The Captain's cabin was, if possible, even more dilapidated than the rest of the ship. A throw rug-turned-fungi-farm lay in the center of the floor. The furniture in the room consisted of a box bed shoved up against the wall and minus the bedclothes, a sea chest at the foot, and a large oaken desk littered with maps, charts and a compass. The windows were partially covered by tattered woven curtains, allowing little light in, which only served to make the figure at the desk seem more solid.

Heels of knee high leather boots propped on the desktop, hands folded in his lap, the ghost 'sat' in a chair that might have been sturdy once. The dark colors and obvious quality of his wide sleeved shirt, vest, and breeches lent him a brooding, commanding appearance; an effect only slightly spoiled by his transparency, and the chair back visible through his chest. Long hair, most likely firey red in life, now registered only as faded rust. Like the other ghosts on board, his eyes had been replaced by dancing tongue of witch fire, the only exception being that his shone an eerie green in place of ebony.

"Ah...The Captain, I presume?" Touma swallowed dryly and scraped his composure up off the floor.

"Correct," The ghost replied, swinging his feet onto the floor and standing. He strode towards them, hovering a good inch or so above the floor. Yet oddly enough, they could hear the faint clicking of boots on planks as he walked.

"You know of me, but I most certainly know nothing of you," He said, raking that verdant gaze over them all. "I can sense several strong spirits, but they intertwine and overlap so that it is difficult to discern one from the others."

"I really don't think there's time for introductions," Shu said, pulling a curtain aside to take a furtive look at the battle, still going strong. The lack of sound lent an ethereal, dreamlike quality to the scene. Shu shuddered and dropped the curtain, clamping a hand over the wound in his side.

"If you were struck by a phantom's weapon, then you may very well be right," The Captain stared at him intently, then switched his eyes to Shin. "Prolonged physical contact with one most often results in..."

"In what?" Touma asked almost skeptically.

The ghost shrugged. "If you take a closer look out the window, you may notice that several of those brawling are neither corsair nor pirate," He gazed expressionlessly at Shu and Shin. "They are either those who were forced to spend too much time aboard my ship, or who suffered the life-stealing effects of ghost collision."

"In other words, it speeds up the process of becoming a phantom yourself," Touma said grimly. The color drained out of Shu's face as he swallowed hard, eyes darting to Shin, then back to Touma.

"We have to get off this ship," He said shakily.

"I'm afraid that would be impossible for you," The Captain's voice almost seemed sympathetic. "Even if you were to leave, you would still slowly degenerate into a phantom. Your friend as well, because the both of you were touched by one."

Stunned silence fell, broken only by the harsh, erratic gasps of Shin's breathing. He still lay where Touma had set him, curled up around himself as though trying to hold in what little body heat he had left. His lips had taken on a frightening blue cast, and all the color had drained out of his skin, leaving it so pale thin traceries of veins were visible.

"No," Seiji's hoarse voice shattered the quiet. He climbed slowly to his feet, gripping a beam for support. "That's not how these spells work."

The Captain's eyes fell on him, the flames flicking to a pale jade for a fraction of a second. "You do not know of what you speak," He said, but there was something in his voice, something that sounded suspiciously like encouragement.

"Yes I do," The Magi's voice slowly grew stronger. "As do you, though I suspect you to be under some sort of geas that prevents you from telling us as much," His eyes narrowed shrewdly. "Yes, I think that's it. Why don't you tell us exactly how this ship came to be under such an enchantment? I suspect we'll find the answer there."

A look of relief came to the Captain's features, though it was difficult to tell, as he had no real eyes with which to express emotion.

"Gladly," He said, a hint of a smile touching his lips. "My name, to begin with, is Shuten, a fact I suspect has been lost to history. I will be brief, for you are rapidly running out of time."

"Too right," Shu grumbled, flexing the fingers on his left arm. "I can't feel anything above my elbow anymore."

"My crew and I were enlisted close to four hundred years ago by the then-king of Taidem," Shuten began. "The piracy problem was rapidly getting out of hand. His own efforts to halt it had failed, so he chose to 'fight fire with fire', as it were. Though my men and I were corsairs by trade, we made our living by ambushing pirate ships, so there was no love lost between us and the members of the Malacaster's fleet. The King promised us a full pardon for our 'vigilante activities', as well as a hefty reward. My crew voted to accept the offer; a few decades of boarding ships on the seas had left us all extremely wealthy, and most wanted to retire, myself included.

"For weeks we hunted down the pirate fleet, tracing their attacks on coastal villages. We waited until the Malacaster was separated from the rest of the ships, and went in for the kill. We thought it would be an easy mark; loaded down with loot as it was, the ship's maneuverability was cut in half, giving us an advantage. The beginning of the battle went as planned. We ran along side the Malacaster, firing our guns into the ship's hull. The pirates had left the majority of their own cannons with the rest of the fleet, in favor of carrying their plunder instead. Before my men even boarded the vessel, it had begun to sink."

The Captain's ghost paused in his narrative, a troubled look clouding his face. He brought a hand up to push his non-corporeal hair from his eyes and traced a transparent finger along the maps scattered across his desk. The flesh and blood members of the audience waited not-so-patiently for him to continue.

"There was a contingency we hadn't planned for," He said finally. "No one had ever been able to explain how the King's Navy had been consistently defeated by these disorganized pirates, but we were to find out first hand. Aboard the Malacaster was a rouge Magi, a powerful one," Shuten looked up at them, his unsettling eyes gleaming brightly in the shadows of the cabin. "When the ship began to sink, and the pirates crossed over to the Vassaar to continue the fight, he...did...something..."

"Something that resulted in," Touma waved a hand around, "This?"

The ghost nodded. "I cannot tell you much of the spell itself, as I remember nothing of it after it touched me. The sea went mad when the Magi made his appearance on the deck of the sinking Malacaster, and a shadow fell over us all, although I know the sky was perfectly clear that day. The fighting men around me began to fall over where they stood...but their spirits rose from their bodies and continued as though nothing had happened. The shadow reached over the deck and swept over me...there was a feeling of cold, difficult to describe, and then I found myself here."

"The cold must be whatever it is that separates a spirit from a body to create a ghost," Touma mused, looking over at Shu, who looked even grimmer, if possible.

"I came to myself in this cabin, and here I have been ever since," Shuten concluded. "For nearly four hundred years I've paced within these walls, trapped by the geas you spoke of earlier. It confines me to this room, and kept me unable to offer any assistance unasked for. The others of my crew come and go as they please, drifting through the closed door, but none of them seem aware. Every so often we encounter drifting ships, and their passengers become trapped here as well."

"We're _not_ going to become a part of that statistic," Shu growled.

"There is no way to reverse a phantom's touch," The Captain sighed. "Haven't you been listening?"

"...What about that 'anchor' thing you mentioned before, Seiji?" Shu turned to the blonde man, suddenly thoughtful. "You said if we could destroy it, everything twisted about this ship would go back to normal."

The Magi nodded. "I thought the anchor would be in the cabin, but strangely enough I feel less sickened here than anywhere else on the ship. Though the feeling became stronger for a while, when we were walking across the deck..."

"Then my guess is the 'anchor' is below decks," Touma concluded. "We may have passed directly over it during that bizarre flashback outside, and never realized it!"

"Do you really think you have a chance of finding whatever it may be, with _three_ of you incapacitated and ghosts roaming the ship?" The Captain arched an elegant red brow, leaning back against the corner of the desk.

"I'll go alone then," The thief shrugged. "I've got a better chance of avoiding the ghosts than the rest of you...not that you're all that mobile at the moment anyway."

Seiji slid back to the ground and reached over to Shin, touching a faintly glowing hand to chill skin. He nodded and looked up at Touma.

"You have a good point. Take my sword; it seemed to have some effect before," He looked pensively down at Shin. "In the meantime, I'll do what I can to keep him from slipping under."

Shu glared stubbornly at Touma, folding his arms over his chest. "I'm coming with you," He said in a no-nonsense tone. "You might need some kind of magical backing."

"You haven't got a clue how to work those new talents of yours." Touma drew the sword from amongst the packs and turned to jab a pale finger into his chest. "I think you'd just get in the way. You could blunder right through one of those ghosts, and I'd get to say 'I told you so'."

"I wouldn't be too far gone to slam you one if you did," Shu's eyes narrowed even further as he swatted the prodding finger away. "What I mean is, I might be able to pick up on the anchor itself. I'll be the first to admit that I know next to nothing about what I can do now, but there's a kind of buzzing feeling where Seiji and Shin are, so I figure I should be able to point out the general location."

Touma frowned thoughtfully, raking a calculating gaze over Shu. Finally he nodded, albeit reluctantly.

"Alright...but if you bite it, I'm leaving you where you fall, understand?" He turned and grabbed hold of the doorknob. Hesitating for a second, he turned back to the Captain's ghost. "Any last words of advice?"

"Don't do anything stupid," Shuten said bluntly. "I've been trapped here for much longer than the rest of you, and I can't say I've enjoyed my stay."

"Oh _that_ was inspirational," Touma rolled his eyes and shoved the door open.

~

The door creaked shut behind them, closing with a very final thud. They squinted against the artificial sunlight, momentarily deafened by the loud cries and crashing of weaponry.

"Touma! Duck!" Shut cried out, quickly stepping back against the cabin wall. Touma dove to the deck, the gust from a sword's passage rustling the hair along the nape of his neck. He hit the wooden planks underfoot and somersaulted back to his feet, Seiji's sword sweeping in a wide arc through the ghost that had menaced them. It flickered for a moment, dancing and wavering like a heat mirage before vanishing, a look of shock stamped upon transparent, yet stubbled, features.

"...They didn't notice us before!" Shu said, dumbfounded.

"Well they do now!" Touma panted, eyes darting about. Several of the pirates had abandoned the usual play of their repetitive battle, and advanced towards them with drawn blades.

Shu cast about himself for something to use as a weapon; Touma hadn't a chance in heaven or hell of taking on every ghost that attacked them. Sooner or later one would get past his guard, and then he'd only end up like Shu himself, or possibly worse off like Shin.

Touma met the first of them head on, Power-infused sword rebounding off the phantom's in a flare of sparks. While he dealt with it, another lunged at Shu from the side. The ex-docker ducked to the left, his chilled hand coming up to grasp the blade. Any feeling remaining in his arm vanished in an instant, but not before he managed to wrest the scimitar away from its wielder.

"Shu!! What do you think you're doing?!" Touma yelped, shocked and alarmed. Shu took a moment to tear a strip of linen from the hem of his already fraying shirt and caught one end between his teeth. A few deft twists of his wrist wrapped the other around his free right hand. Touma dispatched another ethereal warrior as he pried the scimitar from numbed fingers and transferred it to the makeshift gauntlet. 

"I hope, after all that trouble, you know how to use one of those," Touma knocked another cutlass aside, his parry noticeably slower, as though his arm was growing too heavy to lift. "You're only speeding up your own end."

"It isn't going to matter, one way or another," Shu grunted in response. He hacked away at their foes with more force and stubbornness than skill. Fingers of chill worked their way slowly across his chest, emanating from where his left arm hung slack at his side, and the non-existent wound just above his hip.

The two of them were slowly herded towards the center of the deck, until their backs bumped up against the mast. Despite the illusion of noon sun on the high seas, the wooden pillar felt cold and damp through the cloth of their shirts, slick with algae and rot. 

Touma's breath grated harshly in his own ears, every gasp sending red-hot lances of pain to the cramps developing in his upper arm and the stitch in his side. It hadn't escaped his notice that he and Shu were only being attacked by the ghosts of the pirates; it seemed whatever spell manipulated them had no such control over the spirits of the corsairs. Perhaps Shuten still held some influence over his dead men.

"Shu," He said through gritted teeth, "Are we anywhere near where Seiji sensed the anchor?!"

The larger man nodded, leaning heavily back against the mast. He braced himself behind his stolen weapon, ignoring the curious lethargy that preceded the cold. 

"We have to be," He said shortly, "I can barely force myself to move, and these ghosts seem stronger here. They must be drawing strength from it!"

"Gotta get below decks..." Touma muttered to himself, deflecting another attack into the illusory wood of the mast. Blue eyes darted frantically about behind sweat-damp bangs, searching for a staircase, a ladder, anything through the press of brawling seamen. Hell, he'd even take a hole in the deck right about now. 

A hole in the deck..?

Perhaps twenty feet before him, more towards the bow of the ship, a wooden lattice covered a squared off gap in the wood. Below it was a small holding cell, used for the occasional prisoner, loot, or extra cargo. It seemed sturdy enough beneath the false sunlight, but he'd be willing to bet an entire month's take that it wasn't nearly so in reality.

"I've got an idea," He flashed a sideways grin at Shu, who shivered in a sudden chill that had nothing to do with ghosts or spells. "Think you can clear us an opening in that direction?" He nodded towards the lattice, currently hidden beneath many pairs of booted feet.

Shu shrugged. He was getting a terrible feeling of foreboding about all of this, but they hadn't many options. He gathered his strength together and heaved his current attacker back into the crowd, knocking him into several of his fellows. In such a crush, they fell like tenpins, each one taking another two down with him.

"Nice job," Touma congratulated him, sounding rather impressed. He grabbed hold of Shu's numb wrist and took off through the resulting gap. The distance to the holding cell narrowed from twenty feet to twelve in a few long strides, then to maybe four. 

In a flash, Shu realized what he intended. "You can't be _serious?!_"

Touma tugged him along, clearing the last of the stretch without bothering to answer the obvious. Their combined weight left the solid boards of the deck and hit the lattice. With the muffled snapping of rotted wood, the entire thing gave way beneath them, opening up a dark pit under their feet. The two young men plummeted an unknown distance, fragments and splinters of wood raining down around them.

~

Seiji really wasn't a patient person, he was just exceptionally good at faking it. At the moment he soundly cursed his pounding head and churning stomach. He should have gone with Touma and Shu. They couldn't possibly handle something of this magnitude all on their own; they would only succeed in getting themselves killed.

If he hadn't had something to keep his mind occupied, he probably would have gone mad ages ago, but Shin's condition was more than enough to think about. 

The smaller man lay slightly curled on his side, his shoulders and head resting in Seiji's lap. The Magi kept arms around Shin's shoulders, forcing as much warmth as he could into the boy's body. But for all the heat he leached out of the folded legs beneath him, Shin's skin barely seemed to warm. The color was entirely gone from his face, and his lips were completely frost-touched. Seiji brushed back locks of tussled auburn hair, shocked to realize that his own skin was darker than Shin's. The permanent tan had vanished, leaving behind flesh pale enough to be translucent. Traceries of blue veins pulsed just below the surface; some life at least remained contained within the scarcely breathing form.

This hadn't been how he'd imagined dying. He doubted anyone really gave much thought to the end until it loomed. 

"You don't think they have any chance, do you?" Shuten remarked, leaning against the door the other two had recently exited through.

"Shu is too green to be much use, and Touma is completely mundane," Seiji said flatly. "But I suppose there's always a chance."

"You're a real ray of sunshine, Magi," The Captain smirked.

"I'm not here to reassure _you_, spirit." Seiji retorted. Shin sucked in a ragged breath, blunt nails digging into the skin of Seiji's arms as though something pained him. His face twisted into a grimace just as something brushed against the edges of the Magi's senses. Seiji frowned, eyes narrowing to slits as he tightened his arms around Shin's trembling shoulders. Something out there was awake, aware, and confident enough that he was no threat to move without bothering to cloak itself.

"So," Shuten raised his head to glance towards the curtained window. "He is still bound here after all. I had my suspicions, but never any proof that he had remained here."

"That who had?" Seiji asked sharply.

"The Magi responsible for this entire fiasco," The ghost replied, spreading his hands as though that should have been obvious. "Who else?"

~

Shu groaned. His entire body consisted of varying levels of discomfort at the moment. He managed to pull his working arm beneath his body and use it to lever himself up. Bits and pieces of wood fell from his back and shoulders as he did so, landing around him with quiet clunks. 

Another groan echoed back to him from somewhere near his knees. Shu twisted around, trying to make out anything in the pitch darkness that had enveloped him. He groped towards it, hoping he was reaching towards Touma and not some mutated corpse-rat. His fingers met yielding flesh, and were greeted with a startled yelp.

"Awp! Getcher hands offa me!" Touma shot up and scooted away. "This isn't some peep'n play show!"

"Of course not," Shu rumbled, annoyed at the other man's gutter mind. "That would require some light."

"...Ah," The thief's tone was unreadable, but the soft rustling of cloth and the creaking of boards told Shu he was attempting to sit or stand. "Well, we made it below decks, at any rate."

"As soon as I can see you, I'm going to wring your scrawny neck," The docker muttered threateningly. "I'm sure I can manage that one-handed."

"We can discuss my demise after we deal with the anchor," Touma said absently. He eased himself to his hands and knees and felt around for the cool steel of Seiji's sword. They'd both been extremely lucky not to have fallen on it. "Are we closer?"

Shu took his mind off grousing for a moment and focussed. That buzzing, similar and yet different to what he felt when near either Shin or Seiji, encompassed his mind as though sensing that he sought it. It vibrated through his skull, sending unpleasant shivers right down to his teeth and toenails. 

"Much," He replied, voice strained. 

"Good," Touma sat up straight, having finally located the sword's hilt. Shu's own weapon must have dissipated into thin air once it had left his grip. He didn't seem to notice the forced quality of Shu's tone. "Then let's find the door and get this over with.

By that point it was actually possible for one to make the other out in the darkness as a faint light fell from the gaping hole overhead. It seemed the sun from the illusion didn't extend any farther than the main deck, but the light from the real night sky above was sufficient enough to see by. 

The door was simple enough to find. At some point in the past, the hinges had rusted away, allowing it to fall into the holding cell. Shu rubbed at the small of his back, which now sported a lock-shaped bruise.

Touma padded out into the hall beyond, sword held before him. If he ached as much as his companion, he didn't show it. A quick look to both sides assured him that no ghosts roamed the passage, and he gestured for Shu to follow him.

The moment they were both clear of the cell, the oil lamps hanging from their brackets along the walls popped into life. Both Shu and Touma jumped in surprise, falling back to back in case of attack. No sounds met their ears, and after a small eternity of tense waiting, they relaxed.

"Which way?" Touma looked around himself, frowning thoughtfully.

"That way," Shu pointed to his right, "Definitely that way," The buzzing had reached an almost sickening intensity now.

Though they certainly expected an attack, none came. The passageway was filled only with their footfalls. Shu's own knowledge of a ship's interior led him to believe that they were approaching the main cargo hold, but he wasn't sure if a freighter could be compared to a corsair's ship. The lamps behind them dimmed and went out, even as more before them came alight of their own volition. Not too far ahead, a steady golden glow shone from where Shu judged the hold to be.

"I'm beginning to have a bad feeling about this..." Touma said quietly, more to fill the silence than to share his nervousness.

The lights around them went out, plunging them back into darkness. A cold, sourceless wind blew from behind them, whipping their clothes and hair into disarray. Mocking laughter echoed from everywhere and nowhere at once, filling their ears and freezing their blood. Shu's numb arm gave an agonizing twinge in response.

Touma tried to shout to him over the wind, but the words were snatched from his mouth before they ever touched his lips. He broke into a staggering run towards the light, catching Shu's hand in his. They couldn't go back, and while the wind seemed to want them to go forward, they had no other choice.

They broke into the cargo bay, panting and wild-eyed. The wind vanished, but the laughter remained, though it no longer echoed. It no longer seemed loud and booming either, but thin and reedy. And no wonder, as it sprang from the throat of a wizened little mummy of a man.

He floated a few paces above their heads, his legs crossed, claw-like hands gripping his knees. His skin had a definite greenish tinge to it, and clung to his skeleton as if there was no muscle between it and the bone. Beady black eyes surrounded by yellowed whites gazed crazily down at them. The thin slash of a mouth was framed by a long, wispy mustache that drifted about his face as though made of cob-web. He wore a robe that might once have been indigo, but was now faded to a dull lavender.

Directly beneath him, a glass globe rotated slowly. Within it were ever changing images of the Vassaar and the rooms within it from different angles.

"Alright," Touma said after a stunned pause, "I'm guessing the sphere's our anchor...but the little old man?" Shu shrugged.

"Ignorant fools!" The shriveled bat's voice sounded much as they would have expected; wasted and high-pitched with age. "Fools to not know greatness when you see it!"

"You don't suppose this is that Badamon Shuten told us about?" Touma asked, his voice easily overheard by the levitating elder.

"You must have hit your head when we fell," Shu scoffed. "He'd have to be dead by now!"

"Your friend speaks the truth," The old man's voice came in a hiss, "I am the Magi who holds this ship in his thrall, alive these many years. Magic now flows through my veins in place of the blood of mortal men. I need neither food nor water nor air, only my spell to sustain me."

"Likes to hear himself talk, doesn't he?" Shu grabbed hold of a barrel pushed up against the wall and heaved it over his head. "Let's do what we came to do and get out of here!" He hurled the barrel towards the slowly turning sphere of glass, waiting for it to shatter. Instead, it seemed to collide with an invisible barrier. Curlers of gray mist wound about it, squeezing the barrel until it caved under the pressure.

"My spell is flawless!" Badamon exulted, baring yellowed teeth in an insane grin. "Nothing can break its influence! Now the both of you shall join these other poor fools in an eternity as my playthings!" The doors to the cargo hold banged open, and pirate ghosts drifted in, converging on Shu and Touma with moaning cries and hopeless eyes.

Shu cried out in horror as they plunged their hands through his body, spreading the death-like cold throughout his entire being. He fell to his knees, fighting to regain control of himself as they seized him with chill fingers. 

Touma backed up against the wall, gaze flying from his tortured friend, to the ghosts advancing upon him, and then to the laughing husk of a Magi hovering safely above it all. He clutched the worry-stone in his pocket, squeezing his eyes shut and furrowing his brow. He wondered for a moment if it would hurt.

_Let it go_.

His eyes shot open, widening in surprise. What?

_Just let it go faithful one. _

A voice in his head. Another one of Badamon's tricks? The flattened stone in his palm gave a little tremor, almost surprising him into dropping it.

_Leave this to me. I can save them._

He withdrew the stone from his pocket, staring at it for a long moment. Everything around him seemed to slow, giving him all the time in the world to choose.

_You know what needs doing, don't you?_

He did. He just didn't want to do it.

_Let me save them_.

Aw hell...

Touma fisted his hand around the stone, looking up to glare at the Magi as time snapped back to its normal pace. Just before the first phantom reached out to touch him, he drew his arm back and threw the stone with all his might towards the anchor. It slipped through the grabbing fingers of mist, striking the glass and sticking to it as though it were a piece of putty instead of rock. Cracks snaked their way across the surface of the glass, allowing bright rays of light to lance through the fissures and illuminate the room in a blinding radiance. Badamon screamed as the glass shattered, shards and fragments of it tinkling to the ground in a shimmering fall. His form withered even further, skin hardening to a leathery consistency. It cracked and fell away in a cloud of dust, even the screams fading to nothing as his centuries-old body returned to ash.

Shu fell forward onto his hands as the ghosts supporting him vanished. The feeling returned to his body in a flood of heat, leaving a pins-and-needles sensation in his extremities. He sucked in a deep breath, blinking in shock. He...wasn't dead...was he?

He sat back on his heels, going from there to his feet. He looked around himself almost frantically. Touma, where was-?

Oh.

The sapphire glow was a definite hint. Touma hung suspended above the floor by tendrils of cerulean light wound about his body like a marionette's strings. His head was thrown back, the fall of his lashes casting dark shadows over his cheeks, though his eyes remained halfway open. His hands were clasped over his chest, gripping at the fabric of his vest as though his heart ached. He looked more like a limned image in a scribe's storybook than anything real, much less a scruffy second-story thief from the slums of Kichis. 

"...Touma?" Shu tried, hating the way his voice shattered on the last syllable. Oh please let him be alright, pleaseohpleaseohplease...

His eyes came open completely, scaring at least five years' off of Shu's lifespan. There were no whites, no iris, no pupil, just a searing light that shone forth from behind his eye sockets. The bands of light holding him up loosened, slackening off so that his feet touched the floor once more. Shu took a tentative step forward. This wasn't anything he was familiar with. It seemed nothing at all like what he had seen Shin do when working with his Elemental abilities, or the little magic he had seen Seiji use...so what was this? Something different?

"Something outside of your scope of experience," Touma said, but not in Touma's voice. Shu swallowed hard, repetitively. He knew a woman's pitch when he heard one.

Touma(?) laughed lightly and stepped forward towards where the anchor had been. Lying amongst the glittering glass powder scattered across the floor was a single stone, flattened and smooth by constant rubbing. Shu recognized it almost immediately as the pebble Touma fiddled with when thinking or nervous. He didn't touch it now, however, merely stood there gazing at it.

"What are you?" Shu finally mustered up the courage to ask. It would just figure that he survive being mauled by specters only to be struck down by something else. "What have you done with Touma?!"

"He's fine, he's in here with me," The feminine voice answered him calmly, turning to look at him as s/he spoke. "Asleep of course. A human mind couldn't stand being in close proximity to mine for long."

"...You're not human?" Shu swallowed again, his throat going dry.

"Naturally not," S/he seemed content to leave it at that.

Shu, however, was not. "Then what...?"

"I didn't expect you to give up easily," The strange voice said, smiling with Touma's mouth. "I am, to put it in a way you could comprehend, the Spirit of Taidem."

Shu's mind reeled. "But...Taidem is a _country!_"

Touma's blue bangs fell into his eyes as the Spirit nodded with his head. "But it has a soul. And that soul is me," A thumb jerked to his chest. "Mostly I lie dormant, content to observe through dreaming. In recent days, though, the country has begun to fall. Events are coming around that will either make or break it, and I am not one to sit back and allow Fate to decide as she will."

"So you possessed Touma to save us?" Shu's clear blue eyes blinked in confusion. "I don't understand."

"I didn't _possess_ Touma, I _created_ him," The Spirit corrected gently.

Shu staggered as though struck. "_Created?!_"

"I needed a vessel to operate through," The woman's voice explained. "So I extended my Power and created a human with which to work. Every Magi in the world would know if I manifested directly, so instead I use an avatar. Touma is that avatar. He believes himself to be human, complete with memories of a life and past, but in reality, he has existed for only a few weeks. He does not know of this, or that I am capable of manifesting through him."

"You intervened just now so that all your effort wouldn't go to waste," Shu spat. Hell yes he was angry; not even a Spirit as powerful as this one seemed to be had any right to give or take an entire identity. 

Touma's head shook. "No, to save all of you. There is something significant about you, which is why I pushed Touma to go along on your journey."

"Then...you're going to come along with us the rest of the way?" Shu's head was beginning to ache.

"No." The Spirit glanced down at the stone by Touma's feet. "I cannot manifest for long. This simple pebble you see is actually a powerful suppressor stone. It keeps me bound, and protects my vessel from magical attacks. When he cast it into the anchor, it suppressed the spell keeping the spirits trapped here, ending the cycle, but also allowing me to seize control. The moment I touch it again, I will return to being insubstantial."

"Why not just remain in your 'avatar's form?" Shu approached her, not sure where the conversation was heading.

She smiled softly. "When I created his false life, I did too thorough a job. He is more of a person than I had intended; as human now as you or Seiji or Shin. His personality would eventually overcome me." Touma's body went to its knees, one hand now hovering over the stone. "So I will return to Taidem for a while, until I'm needed again. The spell binding this ship outside of the time-stream will shortly reach its end. I suggest you be on your way by then." His fingers closed around the worry-stone, which shone briefly through the gaps between them. Touma's eyes met Shu's and smiled in a way they never had. "Take care of him, will you?"

The suppressor stone drove her from his body, dispersing the bonds of light and returning his eyes to their normal human state. Touma slumped bonelessly forward, and would have fallen face-first into the deck, but was saved from a broken nose by Shu, who quickly dropped to his knees and caught him up. 

The deck beneath him shuddered and groaned, a wail echoed by the surrounding walls of the hold. Shu looked up from staring at Touma's unconscious face, recalling the Spirit's words about the spell's end. Centuries worth of rot and decay caught up with the Vassaar all at once, literally liquefying the boards he crouched on.

The ghost ship collapsed in on itself with a final screech of timber and metal, showering the two young men in splinters and rust. The floor finally gave way, allowing dark water to rush in and greet them. Shu sucked in a lungful of air before it closed over his head, enfolding him in a world of brackish green. 

He could swim, but it was difficult to keep an arm around Touma as well as strike out towards the surface. Especially since he wasn't altogether sure where the surface was. His lungs were beginning to protest, he could feel the pressure increasing at the nape of his neck and in the back of his head.

Something pale and slender darted out and wrapped around his free wrist. Shu thrashed against it, fearful of becoming entangled, but the grip was relentless. The last of his air rushed out of his mouth in a cloud of fragile bubbles. He didn't realize he was being pulled to follow them.

He broke through the surface with a deep gasp, drinking in the salty air in greedy gulps. Sunlight shone redly through his closed eyes, but he was far too tired to pry them open. The restraint left his wrist, only to return a moment later, lifting his hand and pushing a piece of drift wood beneath it.

"Hold on to that, and I'll see to Touma."

Shu managed to crack an eye open, staring with exhausted incredulity at Shin as he pulled the blue-haired thief away and kicked over to another spar of wood. 

"Shin?" He croaked, blinking the salt water away. "But I thought you were ill..?"

"I got better," Came the flippant reply. And indeed, he certainly seemed better; all the color had come back to his face. He didn't even move with the trace of hesitation that marked one recovering from a sickness. Shin tossed a grin over his shoulder as he pounded on Touma's back. "Actually, whatever you did reversed the ghosts' affects, I guess. The whole ship's gone now."

"And it's daylight," Shu leaned his head back to stare at the cloudless blue sky, stretching from horizon to horizon like a bolt of perfectly dyed turquoise silk. 

Shin nodded and shook his dripping hair from his eyes. "You're both lucky I found you; Seiji went on ahead to get his bearings and see what he could salvage while I looked around for the two of you."

"Went on ahead?" 

"Sure, we're not exactly in the middle of the ocean anymore."

Shu turned in the direction Shin indicated, surprised to notice a stretch of beach spotted here and there with hardy clinging shrubs. It was possible for him to make out a lone figure staring inland.

"..Where are we?!" He clung a little tighter to the plank, kicking his legs to propel himself towards the shore.

"Who knows?" Shin shrugged and helped steer Touma after him. "We're not even sure how long we were on board the Vassaar. One moment I was lost in...some sort of endless cold..." He paused for a moment, contemplating the chill that had pervaded every sense he possessed, then shook it off like a dog shedding water, "And the next, Seiji and I are up to our necks in sea water."

Shu's feet kicked up little clouds of powder-fine sand that drifted around his legs. His toes sank into the muddy silt, but he couldn't recall when anything felt so nice. Shin pulled Touma up onto the shore, splashing a little of the cold water onto the pale, still face. His eyes were sunk deep into his skull, thrown into shadow by his brow and marked beneath by dark circles. His cheeks were gaunt and drawn, and his forehead puckered in a constant frown, but at least he still breathed. Shu stood over him, brooding to himself. Should he tell the others what he had learned in the hull of the Vassaar? Should he tell Touma, at least? Would he want to know if he wasn't what he thought himself to be? Would Shu, if the tables had been turned?

No, he decided eventually. Better to let him go on thinking himself to be normal. As long as nothing catastrophic happened, there would be no need for the Spirit to take control of her avatar again. 

"Shu?" Shin looked up at him, questions held within his eyes. "What happened back there?"

"...I'm not sure myself," Came the slow reply. "I'll let you know when I figure it out." He turned and walked slowly down the shore, leaving divots in the sand as he went.

Shin looked down as Touma stirred, his fingers tightening around the gray stone held securely within his hand. The younger man carefully pried it from his grasp and slid it back into the thief's pocket. He seemed attached to the thing, for some unknown reason.

"We had best make camp here tonight Seiji," Shin said, twisting around to speak to the blonde. "With any luck, usable supplies will wash up onshore with the tides. Besides, I don't think Touma's in any condition to move."

Seiji turned towards him, his eyes distant, seeming as though he had only heard the last part of Shin's statement.

"What's the matter?" Shin rose to his feet, dusting away the sand clinging to his knees. "Seems like everyone has something on their minds."

"I'm close Shin," Seiji said quietly, his tone just as faraway as his eyes. "Closer than I was the last time I thought to check. Somehow, our voyage aboard the ghost ship has brought us closer to my old teacher. If I judge correctly, we are within a few days' travel of him."

"That's a good thing, isn't it?" Shin cocked his head to the side, wondering why Seiji seemed so troubled. "You can return home then."

The Magi just sighed and shook his head, turning away to wander in the opposite direction.

Shin watched him go, looked over his shoulder in the direction Shu had gone, and sighed to himself in aggravation. If anything resembling a camp was going to be assembled, he would have to be the one to do it.

((Ick ick ick, I cannot believe how long I took with this thing (though it's like 12 pages long, so you people can stop growling now ^^). It's been what, TWO MONTHS?! I am a bad, bad Authoress. Would not blame you for smacking the daylights outta me, de gozaru yo...*realizes Angel and Risa are going to take that seriously*...eep!

My excuses? Um...I have a job now! And there were finals and SATs...and of course there was that whole fiasco with my dog and the canoe and the can o spray cheese that combusted in the sun....I am totally making that last one up, but the first two are valid. I would have had this up last night, but ffnet decided that everything past the login-screen is confidential material, so I had to wait.

So yeah! That's the ghost captain ^-^ does the whole ghost thing make sense now? Shuten's dead, and I'm not gonna revive him, be this an AU fic or not. But at least he got to tick the boys off ~_^

*throws hands up* I stand corrected! And you had better have meant it when you said you could handle that much fic in one sitting, because this certainly is a rather large helping, as my helpings go, mary d and Khisanth and V.... Ooowah! I have recruited new reviewers! *giddy about that* I would sit here and leave a note to everybody, but I'm currently sneaking net time ~_^ Better just get this up rather than get caught, hm?

The next chapter should be more fun for me to write. Hopefully it means that won't take two months, but it's best not to make any promises that I can't be sure of keeping ^^; ))


	9. Myserious Masked Man tm!

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 8

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimer: With any luck, Sunrise is too preoccupied with the DVD release to notice li'l ol me...ho hum

The pleasant, near tropical weather held through the next day, the sun warming them to the bone as though striving to banish the lingering cold of the ghost vessel. It did little, however, to ease the ache of empty stomachs or the discomfort of dry throats.

Nothing more than driftwood lashed together by rope or sail washed ashore come morning. Shin sighed and poked at the debris halfheartedly. Absolutely useless. His stomach gave a painful growl, latching onto his spine and refusing to let go unless bribed by large quantities of breakfast.

"No luck?" Shu came up behind him, footsteps muffled by the shifting sand. Shin shook his head in dejection, looking back towards him as the big man clamped a hand down over his shoulder.

"We'll think of something," He said reassuringly, but his smile was forced, his confidence faked, and they both knew it.

"I should never have brought you along with me, Shu," Shin smiled sadly, spreading his hands in an apologetic manner. "Now it looks as though we'll starve here. It's better than being drained, I suppose, but it's still an unpleasant end."

"You couldn't have left me behind even if you'd tried, Shrimp," Shu scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest. "I'd have followed you one way or another."

"Stubborn son of a bitch, aren't you?" Shin's half smile, at least, was genuine. 

"We all are," Shu sighed and looked back towards where Touma had burrowed into the warm sand. The thief had come to earlier than the rest of them, waking them all with his incoherent screaming. Shu had been forced to hold him down while Seiji exerted his Empathy to calm him. Touma hadn't fallen back to sleep, but lay there, staring blankly at the sky. When Shin had left to search for supplies, Shu had been sitting by the pale man's side, watching him with a worried little frown. Shin was positive that his friend knew more than he was letting on, but decided not to press the issue. Yet. 

"If there's nothing to be found," Seiji said, approaching silently from the side and startling the both of them. "Then we should leave this place and move on while we still have the strength to do so."

Shin nodded, glancing away from the water. The sandy beach gave way to dunes topped by thorny shrubs and crabgrass. A smudge of trees marked the horizon like low-riding storm clouds. With any luck there was water to be found within walking distance. Or a town, if they were really fortunate.

"Let's pry Touma out of the sand and go then," Shu sighed, obviously not enjoying the prospect of another long hike. 

~

The temperatures climbed as the day wore on, transforming the strip of beach and scrubby grassland into a near-desert. The four of them staggered along the sun-baked ground, squinting against the intensely bright light, panting in the overwhelming heat. 

"Let's...stop and rest..." Shu suggested. He half dragged, half carried Touma, trudging along with the thief's arm pulled around his neck. 

"If you sit down, you're not likely to get back up," Seiji said, staring straight ahead at the near-endless landscape stretching out before them.

"If I _don't_, I'll fall over. And I can promise you I won't be getting back up if that happens," Shu spat, finding a second wind long enough to shoot off a sarcastic comment. 

"Shu's right," Shin added, his voice rather faint. "I feel dizzy..." 

Seiji glanced over at him, brows drawing inward in a slight frown. "...Perhaps we should stop, then."

"Explain to me why you listen to _him_." Touma spoke up for the first time that morning as Shu lowered him to the ground before flopping down himself.

"Because he's more susceptible to the heat than the rest of us," Seiji replied, folding his legs beneath himself and sinking to the ground. "Or rather, to the lack of moisture."

"I'm still here, you know," Shin muttered irritably, irked that they would speak of him as though he wasn't present. He leaned back on his elbows, then gave it up and flopped down onto the dirt. He let out a sigh and shut his eyes against the brilliantly bright sun overhead. The light still glowed red through his eyelids, refusing to leave him be. The ground beneath him was painfully hot, and seemed to leach all the sweat from his body.

"Open your eyes Shin," Seiji said in his commanding teacher-to-pupil voice. "This is no place to be falling asleep."

"I can't help it," Shin didn't bother to crack his eyes open. "I can't feel any running water for miles in any direction. We aren't going to find anything to eat or drink. It's hopeless."

"The Shrimp's got a point," Touma said tiredly, sagging forward over his knees. "I can't even walk without help." 

Shu winced at the bitterness in the blue haired man's voice. Being helpless wasn't pleasant, but he hadn't thought Touma to be the sort who would just give up. 

"...Very well," Seiji said after an awkward moment or two. "We'll have a short rest. But no more talk of lying down and dying."

Touma snorted as he curled up on his side in the meager shade cast by Shu's body. "Who kicked it and left you in charge?"

Shu glanced apologetically at Seiji, wondering why he felt the need to offer an excuse for Touma's actions. The blonde man simply shook his head and returned to staring impassively off into the distance. Shu sighed and crossed his arms behind his head as he leaned backwards into the earth's embrace. He and Shin were lucky in that their skin was already used to long days spent beneath the sun. He'd be willing to bet that the other two fairer-skinned members of the party would be red and peeling by the end of the day.

If they made it to evening, that was. Such troubling thoughts refused to be banished as he sought sleep. Well he, for one, would not be beaten by a bare stretch of ground! He hadn't left his home behind, survived a Siren, fought a Sea Serpent and escaped a ghost ship just to succumb to summer weather, dammit all!

Seiji watched from behind hooded lids as the other members of the little party lapsed into sleep. He listened to their slow, even breathing and tried not to be lulled by it. One of them had to remain awake to bring the rest back around. He sighed irritably, wondering why he always had to be the responsible one.

There came a flicker of movement at the edge of his peripheral vision. The Magi quickly turned to look, but found only the heat-shimmers causing the air to undulate. He sighed and sank back onto his elbows, allowing his eyes to close for a moment's relief from the sun. Just a moment's worth...

~

The brittle shrubs cracked audibly somewhere off to the right. Shin stirred, brows furrowing in annoyance. He'd been having an uncommonly good dream, all cool blue shadows and refreshing breezes, and he didn't appreciate being jolted from it. He muttered something incoherent and curled up on his side to seek the dreamscape out again.

Something wet, rough, and rather foul-smelling was abruptly dragged up his cheek. Shin yelped in surprise and disgust, flailing out with his arms to bat whatever-it-was away. His hand encountered something furry and disturbingly solid. His eyes snapped open, but saw only star-spangled sky overhead. How long had he been asleep?

A shadow loomed over him, a dark silhouette framed by the faint starlight overhead. Shin opened his mouth to cry out a warning, but found his chin caught in a strong grasp. Something was pressed to his lips, allowing blessedly cool liquid to trickle down the back of his throat. Recognizing it as water, he gulped greedily, taking deep swallows. 

The flask was pulled away, but his benefactor pressed it back into Shin's hands before he had a chance to protest. His eyes had adjusted enough to the dark that he could nearly make out his benefactor. The other person's face was hidden behind a mask. The faint light gleamed dully off the matte finish of metal. Though there were eyeholes cut into it, Shin couldn't make out anything beyond them. Nor could he see the rest of the strange person's head, as he wore a hooded cloak with the cowl drawn up.

"Waaah!" 

Shin jumped at the cry and looked over to find Touma grappling with a dark, four-legged figure. 

"Kokuen-Oh." A low, hoarse voice said quietly from behind the mask. "That's enough."

Touma stared in shock and a small bit of fascination as the large, ebon feline that had been batting him around backed off. It padded over to the stranger and sat beside him, its wide, luminous eyes still watching the thief as though he was some sort of threat. 

The scuffle brought Seiji and Shu awake as well. The Magi groped for his sword before remembering that it had been lost when the ghostship sank. Shu, usually a deep sleeper, leapt to his feet and glared the hooded man down.

"Who the hell are you?!" He glanced back and forth between the man and the immense cat. The animal had begun to growl warningly, perceiving some danger to its master. The stranger set a calming hand upon the beast's head but did not look up at the angry young man.

"Shu," Shin tossed the flask to his friend, who caught it instinctively. Shu stared at it in surprise for a moment before looking back to Shin, who shrugged.

"It's water," He said "And it seems to me that he would have done away with us by now if he meant to at all."

Shu shot their silent benefactor one more wary look before taking a deep draught of the refreshing drink. After a moment, he passed it to Touma, who took small, careful sips in order to remind his throat of what it felt like to be wet and get his stomach used to the idea of water.

"While you have a point, Shin," Seiji said, narrowing his eyes at the cloaked figure as though he could see past the metal of the mask, "He still hasn't answered the question. Who are you, sir, and why do you help us?"

The stranger remained silent for so long that they began to believe he would not answer. The flask came around to Seiji who took a swallow without ever removing his eyes from the man and the wild cat beside him.

"I live near here," He said at last. His voice was rough and broken, as though it were a tool this man had long left neglected. "And I was curious to see what type of men are so foolish as to navigate this waste during the daylight hours. Even the animals are not so stupid."

Seiji nodded once and passed the canteen back to its owner. Water still sloshed about inside of it, but no one asked for another mouthful.

"I suppose we are fools," The Magi admitted calmly, "But I notice that you still do not give us your name."

Still there came no answer. The man stood and beckoned his cat along behind him, making as if to leave.

"Wait a moment!" Shin got to his feet, "Could you at least point us in the direction of the nearest town? I know you don't have to help us, but we were shipwrecked and now we're completely lost."

Neither the man nor his companion turned around, but he was answered by the same low voice. 

"I happen to be heading that way myself. I cannot prevent you from following me."

Interpreting that as the closest to an offer of help they were likely to get, the others stood, gathered up what little they had brought, and followed their new guide.

The trek was a quiet one. The masked man's deep silence stifled any inclination to strike up a conversation. There were noises, of course; the scrubby grassland seemed to come alive at night with numerous small creatures. Mice scurried through the thorny, matted undergrowth, and every so often one would shriek in terror as a nocturnal bird of prey swooped in with spread talons. Small catlike animals with bushy tails, large ears and gem-bright eyes watched the humans pass. The sky overhead was gradually lightening; soft dove gray light filtered through the deep blue-black on the eastern horizon. The chill of the night climbed up into a pleasant, dry warmth that promised another scorching day to come. The dark line of trees grew ever closer as they walked, no longer seeming so unreachable.

Every so often the black feline would glance over its shoulder at the four young men, its disconcerting golden eyes meeting theirs as though it knew much more than it was letting on.

"That damn cat keeps looking at me," Touma muttered quietly. "I wonder if it's been fed recently?"

"Kokuen-Oh would never lower himself to feeding upon another sentient being," The man said, a hint of anger in his harsh voice.

"Oh...so the cat has a name, but you don't?" Touma cocked his head to the side and fixed his eyes upon the back of the hood.

"No."

"'No', you don't have a name, or 'no', you do have one but you're not telling us what it is?" The thief persisted.

There was a brief, hesitant pause before he was answered. "...My name would mean nothing to you, as I am not known by it."

"Well what _are_ you known by then?" Touma grinned, sensing that he was finally about to get a straight answer out of the closemouthed man.

"Once," Came the quiet reply, "I was called Kenbukyou."

Shin, Shu and Touma all hissed sharply, taken aback. Seiji frowned, confused by their response.

"What is it?" He asked them quietly.

"'Kenbukyou' is a title, not a name," Shin said under his breath. "It's given to the captain of the King's personal guard, a company of elite warriors loyal to the Crown above all else. Legend says that the first leader of the guard actually was named Kenbukyou, and every successive one has taken that name for himself."

"They're supposed to renounce all personal ties, be invincible with their chosen weapon, and damn near unbeatable with anything else." Shu added, not bothering to lower his voice. 

"I see. You three are natives of Kichis." Their guide said flatly. 

"We are," Touma nodded. "But I don't understand. What would a Kenbukyou be doing weeks' travel from Kichis, in the middle of _nowhere?_"

"You admit to being from the Capitol yourselves," The ex-guard replied, still looking ahead as he strode forward, "And yet you are far from home as well. For, I suspect, reasons you do not wish to discuss either."

"There's a blatant hint if ever there was one," Seiji muttered.

"But the guard still exists," Touma, having latched onto the subject, refused to let it go. "Though there aren't as many since there's no real Royal Family to protect anymore."

Even from beneath the cloak, the tensing of Kenbukyou's shoulders was evident. Touma smirked to himself in satisfaction. Shin took him by the elbow and hissed into his ear.

"I think you should drop it now..."

"Ahhh, so _that's_ it, isn't it?" Touma ignored the advice and stepped forward quickly so that he stood before the masked guard. "You were the Kenbukyou twelve years ago, when the King's Magi went rouge." Met only with silence, he continued thinking aloud. "And you must have been exiled after the Royal Family was murdered, since the guards are supposed to lay down their lives to defend the Royals."

"Touma!" Shu barked, glaring angrily at the thief. "That's enough! You're going to get your fool head kicked in, and I for one won't blame sir Kenbukyou for it."

"But I'm right, aren't I?" Touma said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Leave well enough alone, Touma," Seiji said sternly. Kokuen-Oh growled in agreement.

"You are correct in all details but one," The hoarse voice took them all by surprise. "I was not exiled. None of us were. The surviving guards were not penalized for failing to defeat so powerful a Magi, but we could not forgive ourselves. Many of us took our own lives in shame. I chose to live with my failure." He touched a hand to his masked face, his fingertips lightly brushing the metal. "I had given up my name to become the King's protector. It seemed only fitting that I should also relinquish my face when I could not save him."

"So you came here, where no one who had been in Kichis that day would find you," Shin surmised. 

"It's not as though the Royal Line's completely gone, you know," Shu said awkwardly. "There's still that one son..."

"I strongly disagree with the methods the Magi are using to keep him alive," Kenbukyou replied coldly, striding forward again. "I do not believe that my King would desire innocent people to die so that his son might live."

"I'll wager that attitude didn't win you any allies with the nobles, either," Touma fell to the side and let him pass, wincing as the rough hem of the cloak snapped against his legs. 

"Yet another reason why I choose not to associate with people from Kichis."

Seiji, who had not been present in Taidem during the slaughter twelve years before, simply absorbed all this information and tucked it away for future reference. It seemed there had been quite a bit more going on in the neighboring kingdom than the rumors back home had let on. He made a mental note to question Shin further on the matter once they reached a safe haven, half listening as Shu apologized for Touma's large mouth and total lack of respect. He wondered for a moment what Kenbukyou hid behind that mask. The man possessed a strange aura, one that roiled and churned as though it constantly tried to bury something deep beneath it.

"Is something the matter?" Shin asked him quietly, discreetly withdrawing from Touma and Shu's now familiar exchange of insults. 

"No, nothing," Seiji assured him, lips quirking into a small smile. "I was just wondering how far we have left to travel until we reach a village."

"A day and a half," Kenbukyou answered, though the question had not been directed to him. Shu and Touma abruptly stopped arguing and redirected their attention to the new topic. "The nearest sizeable community is nearly a two-day journey in that direction." He pointed off to his left. By now they had come so close to the forest that they were able to make out individual trees. The path Kenbukyou indicated looked as though it would take them deeper into it. 

Without warning, the ex-guard turned to them, producing from somewhere beneath his cloak two canteens made of cured leather stretched over a wooden frame. He shoved them into Shin's hands and took a step back.

"This is where we part ways," He said. "When you reach the forest, stay along the edge of the treeline. Soon you will encounter a small stream. I suggest you fill these there, and continue on foot. I have no provisions to offer you, but you will find small homes when you come to the end of the forest. If you manage to keep up this pace, that should be around evening." He glanced skyward, where traces of peach and pale, delicate pink tinged the lightening gray. "I wish you luck in your journey, Magi. Should I encounter any of the King's men that undoubtedly follow you, I will misdirect them as best I can. But I suggest that you leave Taidem and find someplace where being an Elemental is not punishable by death."

By the time the four travelers had managed to pry their jaws out of the sun-baked ground, Kenbukyou and Kokuen-Oh were both out of earshot.

"...How did he know?!" Shu finally said, shaking his head in surprise.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he had an ability to sense magic," Seiji replied slowly, wondering if perhaps that was what he had felt about the man. "It certainly would have been useful in his previous line of work."

"Then he knew all along," Shin hefted the empty canteens, listening to them clack hollowly against each other. "Maybe that's the only reason he helped us, because he knew we were running from Kichis too."

"Maybe," Touma agreed. "But then again, maybe he had his own reasons."

"Whichever it is," Seiji said, "We had better get under the shade before the sun rises. We do want to make it to that stream before the heat becomes too intense."

The other three nodded. Shu reached over and took one of the canteens from Shin, slinging it over his shoulder as he struck off towards the trees. Seiji and Shin followed him, not noticing when Touma paused for a moment to watch the two dark figures of Kenbukyou and Kokuen-Oh as they began their journey home.

* * *

AN: Well what do you know...this chapter took me _exactly_ two months to complete. I am disgusted with myself, especially since it's only six pages long -_- To be honest, I sat down and wrote the majority of it this afternoon. I can't say what kept me from writing, because I'm not sure myself. I couldn't write _anything_. This is actually more of a filler-chapter, done mainly so the characters could cover some ground. 

I also glossed over the fact that Kokuen-Oh is a tiger. I just don't see how a tiger could be black, because then you wouldn't be able to see the stripes, right? *is confused* So then it wouldn't be a tiger, correct? Eh...so he's just a big black cat.

Credit for motivation this chapter goes to ReRe-san for nagging me, (although she only did it so I'd be free to work on Steps...) and Ria ne-san for loaning me her muse. I have no idea where mine vanished to, although I believe the feline one is currently passed on my pillow.

I kinda get the feeling people are going to be pissed at me...but I will do my list of 'Thank You's anyway! Ta da:

Angel- I think I'm offended! *gasp* You make it sound like I never ever update! I'm not all _that_ lazy (Shoosh, I know you're laughing). If you gang up on me, there won't be anymore chapters, so there! I'm guessing that's the only thing keeping me alive right now. *glomp* But you love me anyway!

Risa- o.o Goddamn! That's the longest review I have ever received in all my days of FFnet-ness. Have I thanked you for your wonderful reviews lately? Yeep! I can't tell you what I'm going to do to Touma, because that would be spoiling quite a bit, but he seems to have so many fans that I'm afraid to do anything mean to him...

Touma: *smirks oh-so-smugly*  
Me: *steals one of Angel's pig-stickers and baps him with it* Of course, if he keeps this up...

It's so nice to know that my writing keeps people on the edge of their seats! Please, do not kill me! Death by Dictionary is so demeaning...

Khisanth-It took me another two months ^-^;; I sure hope you're still sticking around! I don't think Shu will be telling Touma the truth any time soon. Think about it; Would _you_ want to know that you weren't actually real? I sure wouldn't! But of course he'll have to find out eventually...maybe...ish....*snickers* I got Monty Python flashes myself when I went back and re-read it! I didn't mean for that to happen, but oh well. As long as nobody sues, it should be fine. NI!

Physh-If you ask me, Touma's getting entirely too much attention. He'll become impossible to live with if you and everybody else don't stop worshipping him. I need to do something about his smart-ass-ness.

Sumsum-I intend to put this chapter up on the board as well, if only to kickstart the damn thing *sweatdrop* But I'm glad you've been keeping an eye open for new chapters ^_^ I had to laugh when all these people gasped and said "Whoa, you got _Sumsum_ to review your fic!" I must be lucky to know someone as infamous as you!

MaryD-Yes, exactly two months, on the dot, no less! *laughs* I'm so sorry...But considering that I'm juggling a webcomic, RPGs, and lots of other fics, a chapter every two months doesn't seem totally unreasonable, I don't think. I'll try to write the other one sooner, I really will. Summer has turned me into a vegetable. As to all your guesses about who's who...I can reveal nothing! 

Ninxa-I'm glad I managed to surprise you with the ending! I don't want to write a story that the readers can predict. If I want you people to keep coming back, I have to keep you on your toes ~_^

Kar-chan-You're not the only one with a messed up sleep schedule. I don't think I've gotten up before noon at all this summer. I'm so bad. Good to know you think it's worth the wait *smirks* and I should hope I managed to throw you off guard with Touma's backstory. Geez, I didn't even know what he was going to be until I sat down and wrote it. 

Yamino Tora-Ah, but since you expected him to be one, I had to do something different! Honestly, I didn't know what to do with Touma until I wrote it. He even surprised me! ^_^ I like to keep my stories kind of amusing, since I'm not such a huge fan of angst. I'll try not to take so long this time, I promise.

V-Lady-Oh no! Not the wet noodles! *has been whipped by wet noodles before* Do you have any idea how hard those are to get out of my hair? Ick! I cower to think what forces you may be gathering....

Leigh-0.0 Yeep! Don't _hurt_ yourself! Get some sleep! Though I must say, Death Threats are the best way to get me working. I finished a chapter of another story within two days after someone sent me a death threat ~_^ You seem to be a violent reader to me, but I'll overlook the psychoticness in favor of regular reviews.

Kathrine-If you sit back and think about it, I think you'll figure out who Ryo is. *smiles* I haven't really tried to keep it a big secret or anything. I won't come out and _tell_ you, but I have mentioned him already. People sure seem to be getting anxious about him.

Melee-^_^ Thank you! I'm rather proud of how I'm writing Seiji as well, since I've never had much to do with him before. I promise that Ryo will make an appearance...it just won't be for a while. And as for Tiger...-.- Uhm...I'll get back to you on that one!

Angelrain- Well I didn't post this chapter all that soon, but at least I wrote it! Your question about Seiji's whole story should be answered within the next chapter, but like I told Melee and Kathrine, Ryo's staying out of it for a while. It's not that I don't like him, I just had to cast him as a particular character who won't be appearing for a while! But he will. I like him too much to keep him out of it.

Damn, that's a LONG list of thank yous, but I really do appreciate every review that I get. ^_^ I'm the sort of person that needs to be nagged at to write.

However, I sort of have a request to make...if ANYBODY is willing/able to be my beta reader, I would be extremely grateful. I need someone who can get back to me within a day (or two at the most), and nitpick about my grammar, sentence structure, etc. I don't really have anybody I can ask. Thank you!

I'm done now ~_^ 


	10. Confrontation

Mark of the Magi

Chapter 9

By

Lily of Trust

Disclaimer: *in Lily's place is a little yellow sticky note, reading 'YST is the sole property of lots of people that aren't me. I would sell my soul to be able to draw manga that nicely. Sadly, my soul is being held captive by the evil that is Honors Government. More on this when I finish my homework'.

True to Kenbukyou's word, a clearly beaten path wound its way between the densely packed trees. These woods held very little in common with the tropical near-rainforest where they had battled the Sea Serpent scarcely five days earlier. The trees here were mostly fragrant pine, but scrawny from lack of moisture and soil. Unlike the tremendous forests further south, where the root system of single trees often spread throughout twenty feet of ground or more, these were packed closely together. They seemed to grudge even the narrow space allotted to the path. 

At least things were cooler here than the scrub land. Fallen pine needles crunched dryly underfoot as the four young men traveled through the shade. Though the view of the sky was obscured by the treetops, the rising and falling of the temperature around them marked the passage of time. They paused for a rest about midday, passing around the canteens Kenbukyou had given them. The stream had been left behind long hours before, but the water had been carefully rationed throughout the morning. Plenty of water sloshed about inside the stretched hide.

Shin and Shu spoke quietly together as they rested against the rough bark of an ancient pine. Touma plopped down beside the path, and Seiji stood alone, gazing in the direction they headed.

"What Kenbukyou said before," Shu mused as Shin took a long draught of water. "About misleading our pursuers? Sounds like he thought we were being followed."

"I don't see how that's possible," Shin replied, dragging the back of his hand across his mouth. "When you get right down to it, _we_ don't even know where we are. That encounter with the ghost ship could have washed us ashore anywhere. All we know for sure is that now we're only a few days away from the man Seiji's looking for, when before we were weeks behind him. How could any followers have kept up?"

"That's a good point." Shu leaned his head back against the tree trunk and dropped into a sullen silence. Shin re-corked the canteen they'd shared and sighed to himself. He recognized the broody expression on his friend's face. Shu seemed to get that look every time he mentioned the events that had lead to the shipwreck. 

"Shu, what's been going on with you lately?" Shin ventured to ask. "Since the Vassaar-"

"What about it?" The other man said sharply. "There's nothing to tell Shin. We fought a ghost, broke the spell, and sank the ship."

"There's more to it than that, and we both know it," Shin kept his voice firm but low, so as not to attract the others' attention. "How could either of you have dispelled a curse that held for hundreds of years?!" He jabbed a finger just below his friend's breastbone, his eyes narrowing dangerously as he glared at Shu. "I was _dying_, Shu, and then I wasn't. Explain that to me. Something happened to reverse the cold touch, something that has Touma living in a daze. You're the only one of us who knows for certain, but for some reason you're being a stubborn _ass_ about it!"

Shu winced and leaned back away from the painful prod of Shin's finger. It wasn't often he saw Shin genuinely angry, much less at him, and the irate gleam in those green eyes was thoroughly cowing. He found himself stammering a reply, though he hadn't meant to say a thing.

"It was...Touma...I mean, he-"

"Quiet you two!" Seiji said sharply, slicing his hand through the air. "Something's coming this way."

Silence fell like an axe-head. Touma rose quietly to his feet and took a step back from the path. His movement scarcely stirred the pine needles underfoot. From some distance away came the sound of rustling and snapping branches. They hadn't seen any animals large enough to brush the low hanging branches, but most humans knew better than to make so much noise when traveling such a little used trail.

"We're supposed to be a half-day away from other people yet, aren't we?" Shu murmured under his breath to Shin, who nodded and shifted forward into a crouch.

The crunching and cracking grew louder. An absent, tuneless whistle could now be heard over the din. 

A man turned the twist in the path, his whistling faltering for a moment as he met four wary pairs of eyes. He wore plain homespun trousers stained some indeterminable color by constant use, and an equally battered pair of heavy work boots. He wore no shirt, though one was tied about his waist. Old scars crisscrossed his chest and stomach, leaving pale lines through the tanned skin. Upon his shoulder he carried a load of quartered logs. Each one was easily as thick as a man's wrist, and there were perhaps two dozen in the bunch. Lashed to the top of the bundle was a hatchet, the blade scarred with frequent use. 

"Eh?" The stranger pushed sweat-damp bangs, so dark a blue as to be nearly black, from his forehead. Piercing blue eyes, calm but sharp nonetheless, swept over them. An inverted cross-shaped scar marred the skin beneath his left eye. 

Shin wondered what he made of their haggard little band. Their threadbare clothes had been badly frayed by the wind and sea and sand. Their garments were ill fitting, as it had been nearly three days since they had swallowed anything but water or grit. They were scraped, bruised, and held themselves in the wary posture of hunted men.

"Afternoon," the woodcutter said genially, shrugging a shoulder to ease the load. Shin was wryly amused to note that the tips of his fingers settled lightly against the butt of the axe. Perhaps he thought them to be bandits or cutthroats. Shin wasn't sure if such things were common in this countryside. 

"Good afternoon," Seiji replied for them. His right hand closed over empty air at his hip as he groped instinctively for a hilt that was no longer there.

The stranger's eyebrows rose slightly at the sound Seiji's foreign, aristocratic accent coming from someone whose clothes belonged in a rag-bin.

"You'll have to pardon my surprise," He said dryly, "But this trail is used only by myself and a few bush-deer. It doesn't see much human traffic."

"We were not expecting to see anyone else either," Seiji replied. "I apologize if we startled you, but we were told we might find a town out this way, or at least someplace to barter for food."

"If you'll pardon my saying so, you don't look like you've got a damn thing to offer in return for it," The stranger said skeptically.

"That tends to happen when you're shipwrecked," Touma spoke up. He sat cross-legged, his chin resting in the palm of his left hand.

"Shipwrecked?" The man said incredulously. "But there haven't been any storms! And there are no rocks or reefs here-abouts to crash into." He snorted and shifted the bundle of wood again. "You must be mighty poor sailors."

Shu bristled angrily, and Shin reached out to quickly grab his shoulder. "It's a little complicated," He explained, smiling apologetically.

"Well if nothing else, it seems you can offer a story for your supper," The woodcutter suggested. "I can think of someone who might be interested to hear about your travels."

"Can you?" Shin sat up a little straighter, hunger prompting him to pursue the possibility.

"It so happens this firewood is for him. I doubt I could keep the four of you from following me if you had a mind to," The slight smirk that pulled at the corner of his mouth told them otherwise. That said, he continued on his way, gaze fixed pointedly on the path ahead.

"Food for a tale?" Touma snorted skeptically. "Who'd be senseless enough to accept a trade when the benefits are _that_ one-sided?"

"You're a thief, Touma," Seiji said reasonably as he stepped out onto the path. "You are aware that some people pay for information, aren't you?"

"Yeah?" Touma raised his chin from his hand, looking at Shin and Shu incredulously as they too stood to follow. "So?"

"Think of it as a meal for information, instead of a tale," Seiji called back over his shoulder. "I have the feeling that would be more accurate anyway."

~

The temperatures dipped a little as late afternoon wore on. Goosebumps pricked at bare flesh, though they panted from the exertion of the walk. Attempting to trek day in and day out with nothing but a few swallows of water sloshing around in ones' belly is _not_ a wise idea.

"He had to go _this_ far for firewood?" Touma grumbled under his breath, shooting a baleful glare at their guide's back. "And what would anybody need a fire for anyway? It's summertime!"

"It gets chilly at night," Shu said shortly, conserving his breath for walking. "And most people don't hack up the trees around their houses. Makes for an ugly view."

Touma snarled something that should have made Shu's ears curl up, and transferred the glare on the larger man. Shu just smiled faintly, apparently too used to the curses, or too tired, to be affected by them.

His irritation spent, Touma sidled in closer to Shu and tipped his head back over his shoulder, indicating Seiji and Shin following several paces behind.

"They've been awfully quiet."

"Not _everybody_ feels the urge to ruin a perfectly nice silence with talk."

Touma scowled, though it was more thoughtful than angry. "I mean it's not like Seiji to be so withdrawn. He's kind of sucking into himself. Have you noticed?"

Shu plodded along silently for a few moments. He had indeed noticed the change. Seiji had always been stoic, but now he was just plain brooding

"Yesterday he said we were close to the man he's been searching for," Shu lowered his voice, that neither Seiji nor the woodcutter might overhear. "Maybe we're nearer than he thought. Maybe he's feeling some kind of side effect, or he's just trying to figure out what he'll do when he finds that man. He did say he wasn't sure what would happen when they faced each other again."

Touma nodded, the scowl smoothing out into a small frown. "And Shin?" His eyes flicked back towards the younger man, who walked quietly beside Seiji. There was an unusual amount of worry in the glance, as though Touma feared the heat really _was_ affecting the Water Elemental.

Shu chuckled. "The Shrimp's pretty good at picking up on moods. He probably figured that something was bothering Seiji way before you did. My guess is he's just being silent support."

Shin smiled to himself and shook his head. Shu might have taken care to speak under his breath, but his furtive manner betrayed the fact that he didn't mean for anyone but Touma to overhear what he was saying. It was obvious to him that they had finally noticed Seiji's sullen silence. The Magi had been behaving oddly since they had begun following their strange guide. Though he didn't know it, Shin had come to the same conclusion as Shu; that Seiji's odd mood had something to do with the proximity of his old teacher. It had been some two or three hours since they had left their resting place behind, and the blonde had yet to say a word. 

"Seiji?" Shin said quietly, trusting that Touma and Shu would be too involved in their own conversation (which had predictably escalated into bickering) to overhear. "What's the matter?"

Seiji's mouth tightened into a thin line. His gaze slid over to Shin, raking him up and down as if considering something. Intentions flitted behind violet eyes; would he tell the truth, or feed his pupil some line of reassurance? Shin hoped fervently for the former.

"We're close, aren't we?" He asked, more or less limiting Seiji's options.

The older man sighed, dropping his eyes to focus on the tangled path they trod. He raked a hand through his hair, attempting to tuck it back into the short tail. Shin waited patiently, though the answer, when it finally came, was much briefer than he had expected.

"Yes."

Okay...well, he could work with that. He held his tongue a few moments more, giving Seiji the chance to elaborate before prompting him once more.

"Do you think he's living in the village up ahead?"

"No," Seiji's lips twisted into a wry, humorless smile. "I think he's the man we're to meet over dinner."

Shin started, almost tripped over an exposed tree root. He stumbled forward, struggling to regain his footing before either Shu or Touma noticed. Seiji grasped him by the elbow and helped him get his balance back, the smile holding the faintest hint of amusement.

"Wh...what makes you think _that?_" Shin blurted once he could walk without aid. "Is it that sense of yours?"

"Yes," Seiji nodded, lifting his head to stare fixedly at the woodcutter's back. "But more than that, that man carries traces of his power."

Shin frowned, thoroughly confused. His knowledge of magery was severely limited; what little expertise he could claim lay solely within his own abilities, and Elemental magic was by definition confined to a single element. 

"I don't understand."

"Think of it like this..." Seiji began slowly, brow furrowing as he attempted to translate what he sensed into terms Shin could understand. "When two people spend a great deal of time around one another, they begin to 'rub off' on each other, do they not? They may adopt characteristics of the other." Shin nodded, able to grasp that concept "When Magi spend time among others, they leave an impression of their own power, their aura, on those people. Since everyone's aura is unique, it's easy for another Magi to notice when traces of one person's aura is stuck to someone else's."

Shin frowned, struck by the image of people unknowingly walking around with streamers of glowing light trailing from their bodies. 

"And you felt your teacher's 'aura' on this man?"

"Precisely." Seiji nodded now, "Our guide strikes me as a solitary person, unlikely to enjoy living within the boundaries of a village. Why else would he spend so much time alone in the middle of a forest? I find it hard to imagine him associating with too many people. It's only logical to assume that he shares living quarters with the person he's bringing the wood to. Given the aura impression, I figure it must be my quarry." 

Shin sighed. He was too tired to run through such convoluted paths of logic. His head hung low out of exhaustion as they walked. He turned this new information slowly over in his mind, straightening suddenly as something occurred to him.

"Seiji?"

"Hm?"

"If a Magi leaves traces of his power on those he associates with, that would mean that _your_ power is impressed on me, Shu and Touma, wouldn't it?"

"Correct."

"And some of mine would have rubbed off on you?"

"And Shu and Touma, yes."

"...So when, if, we're found...the Guard Magi will know all of you are involved with me."

Seiji shot him a sidelong glance. "Well that hardly matters now, does it? We're who-knows-how-far away from Kichis. And Shu is an Elemental in his own right, now. In a short while he too will begin leaving impressions on all of us." He looked thoughtful. "In fact...this reminds me of something Shuten said, when we were on the Vassaar. That he could ' sense several strong spirits', but they intertwined and overlapped so that it was difficult to discern one from the others."

Shin's shoulders slumped. "I don't really want to think about the Vassaar."

They both fell silent for a few minutes more, before Shin's churning mind popped out another question.

"Seiji?"

"Hm?"

"Wouldn't your teacher have left an aura trace on you? And you on him?"

The corner of Seiji's mouth quirked up into a crooked smile. 

"How did you think I was tracking him?"

The implications of that statement were not lost to Shin, who stared at the blonde man and swallowed hard.

"Then he knows you're coming."

Seiji smiled grimly.

"Undoubtedly."

~

The sun was only just beginning to set when the trees fell away sharply. The ground had been sloping steadily upwards for some time, but now they could see they had been climbing a hill, and that someone had cleared the trees away from the upper half. A modest house sat atop the summit, a few sheds and outbuildings squatted just behind it on the downward slope of the hill. Lights shone in two of the four visible windows and a thin wisp of smoke curled from a slightly lopsided chimney. 

The woodcutter continued his steady trek. The trail they had been following all day widened into a well-tended path, absent of vindictive tree roots.

"Please, please tell me that's our stop," Touma begged, his plea directed at no one in particular. Shu rolled his eyes and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. He was tired; his limbs dragged with a bone-deep weariness that only weeks of rest could dispel. Too bad they didn't _have_ weeks. Hellfires, they'd be lucky if they got more than a day. 

The woodcutter grunted in what could have been meant as an affirmative.

Shin sighed in relief; he could barely take a step without tangling his feet together; a problem that had nothing to do with a still-growing frame. He was too exhausted to even consider that they might not be granted shelter that night, and _far_ too tired to care that the house itself was likely owned by a man who would have no reason to grant courtesy to Seiji. 

The Magi had gone silent again. His hands were clenched tightly at his sides, his mouth compressed into a thin line once more. There was no doubt in Shin's mind that the man he sought _was_ indeed here.

They reached the top of the hill, and clattered to a stop as the woodcutter climbed the two uneven steps to the door. He rapped the knuckles of his free hand against the solid wood planks and stood back as the door swung open.

"I'll stow this around the back," He said gruffly. Then, almost as an afterthought, he jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "People to see you."

He stepped down off the side of the stair and disappeared around the side of the house, leaving them to face their host.

He was much as Nasuti had described, pale from head to foot. Though his face was unlined by age, his hair was alabaster white, left unbound to fall to his shoulders in loose waves. His skin so fair it was easy to imagine he had never set foot in the sunlight. Even his eye was nearly colorless, a blue almost as faint as the first hint of morning sky. Indeed, _eye_. As the witch had told them, he wore a black silk patch over the empty socket of his left eye. Aside from it, his face bore no other scars or marks that spoke of injury. He wore a light gray tunic over loose trews several shades darker. His feet were bare, and he stood with them hooked casually at the ankles as he leaned against the doorframe.

That pale eye flicked from face to face, registering Shu, Touma and Shin, and dismissing them out of hand. Though his neutral, almost bored, expression never wavered, his gaze sharpened as it settled on Seiji.

The blonde lifted his chin, somehow incredibly dignified despite his bedraggled expression. All the lavender bled out of his eyes, leaving them a steely gray that openly challenged the washed out blue. The two of them stool perfectly still, measuring the other by sight alone...or perhaps there were arcane examinations underway that the other three were simply unaware of. Tension crackled openly on the air. The temperature seemed to drop several degrees.

Touma swallowed loudly, almost (but not quite) intimidated by the sheer hatred in Seiji's eyes, and the pale man's cold, calculating stare. Shu remembered suddenly that he needed to breathe, and sucked in a quick breath to dispel the dizziness brought on by lack of air. He reached over and grabbed Shin by the elbow, pulling him back away from Seiji almost protectively. Shin looked at him questioningly, and found nothing but a grim expression on Shu's face. He didn't want his smaller friend in the line of whatever fire might be coming.

"Well, Seiji," said the pale man. His voice was deep, but cultured. It carried the same aristocratic lilt that colored Seiji's. "I wondered when you would find your way here. For a while I thought you had given up." The barest hint of a smile ghosted about his mouth. "I suppose I should have known better. Though I am curious as to how you regained so much ground so quickly. Would the tale have anything to do with your empty scabbard?"

Seiji's fists tightened. His knuckles stood out whitely against skin tanned a few shades darker by long days on the deck of one seafaring vessel or another. When he spoke, it was in a very clipped voice, as though he was afraid his words would betray his control.

"That is irrelevant. What matters is that I am here now."

"Yes," His old teacher said, amusement plain in his tone. A muscle jumped at the corner of Seiji's jaw as he fought to keep his composure. "So you are."

"You know why."

The others drew back at the sheer rage in his voice. Shu's grip tightened on Shin's arm, though whether it was out of fear or to make sure neither of them moved forward and got in the way, neither was sure. Touma stood his ground, his arms crossed tightly over his chest. There was something in his eyes that spoke of knowledge, of approval. He knew something they did not.

"Actually," Something shifted in the pale man's stance. Muscles tensed almost imperceptibly beneath the gray tunic. He expected trouble. Shin would have been willing to lay odds that he'd get it. "I do not."

Seiji rocked back, shock openly displayed on his features. He hadn't been expecting that response.

"How...but you..." Lavender eyes narrowed, seethed with anger. "_You-_" He spat. Either he was about to launch into a rant, or launch a fist into the man's good eye.

"_I_," The man in question drawled dryly, "Would like to know whether you came here looking for your teacher, your errant brother-in-law, the man who shamed your sister, or..." He let the sentence dangle in midair. Shu and Shin held their breath, though they weren't certain why. Touma waited, the something in his eyes now akin to sadness. Seiji's eyes widened, his mouth dropped open as though he could somehow halt the words about to be spoken.

"Your lover."

((AN: ...Well...I live, apparently.

It's been _how_ long since I updated this story? Since last September? *winces* Goddamn...I can't possibly make an excuse for such a long, unexpected hiatus.

I can offer a couple things in my defense. Like college applications, finals, a fledgling webcomic, original fiction that needed attention, scholarships...assorted other Real Life crap. But really, I could have finished this at any time, so I'm not going to make erroneous excuses.

Bluntly put, I didn't want to write this story anymore. It was turning into a chore, not something I was doing for fun. And y'know what? If you don't enjoy what you're doing, then it's just not worth doing, dammit! So I took a break. Admittedly, an unexplained one. I didn't offer any warning, I just kinda vanished from every fandom on the face of the earth.

Then the other day I just decided randomly to stick up an old one-shot fic I wrote ages ago. And I looked at this fic, and saw that some strange souls (Destiny's lot, Prosopopeia) left reviews asking where I'd been, and warning me not to drop this. And I saw how many reviews the last chapter got, how many reviews I never responded to. Then I remembered everything I wanted to do with this story, and how many plot twists I was letting go to waste.

Owchie on me.

So yeah, I'm getting back into fanfiction now. The school year's almost done, I've got this webcomic thing more or less under control (kinda sorta...), and the lovely Rae (MistressCale to most of you) has started a YST RPG. It kinda rekindled my interest in the fandom ^^ I get to play Shin again! 

I don't really expect lots of reviews for this chapter. Truth to be told, it's been sitting half-written on my harddrive since last October. I figure I've lost most of my readers, and if I hear _anything_ from them at all, I will die of shock. Of course, the odds are good that if I _do_ hear from you guys, it'll be something "AUGH! WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING DISAPPEARING LIKE THAT?!" And I have it coming too. I doubt Risa, or Strata-chan, SumSum, Angel, or Khisanth, not to mention oodles of others (naming all of whom would make this AN so much longer that it already is -.-) will be too pleased, if they happen to read through.

So um...that's about it. I dropped a bomb this chapter ^-^; I can guarantee that the next one won't take me seven-eight months to write, but I'm not imposing any deadlines on myself either. It just makes for stress that I don't really need right now. In other words, I'll see ya when I see ya, and I'll be bringing fic with me *grins* Great Good God, I forgot how much fun these characters are to play with!


	11. Unfair Comprimise

Mark of the Magi  
  
Chapter 10  
  
By  
  
Lily of Trust  
  
Disclaimer: As previously stated, I do not own any characters displayed herein. Suing me will result in very very little, as I am nothing more than an unemployed college freshman ^^ ...Anyway, I didn't create the assorted bishounen, I just like to take terrible, evil liberties with them. We all have our hobbies.  
  
~  
  
"On the upside," Touma said thoughtfully, "We're still getting a meal outta this."  
  
Two wooden spoons and a battered pot lid made contact with his head before he had the sense to duck, fortunately avoiding the cutting board en-route to his skull.   
  
  
  
"Touma," Shu growled, Not Amused, "It's bad enough that we're stuck in here with you. The least you can do is shut your fool mouth...before I lodge something up your nose." He hefted a plucked chicken-leg in a threatening manner, and Touma wisely swallowed any retorts.  
  
  
  
Shin sighed and concentrated on pulling fistfulls of feathers off the remainder of the bird. He wasn't happy about being shut up in a tiny kitchen with those two either. He'd much rather there were three other bodies in there with him. But their host had made it perfectly clear that if they wished to eat, not to mention avoid a blood-letting, they were to stay put.  
  
  
  
Said host had made it equally clear to Seiji and his ex-teacher (Shin couldn't quite bring himself to think about what the one-eyed man had also been to Seiji) were not, under any circumstances, to kill each other on his front lawn.   
  
  
  
~  
  
"Rajura," The woodsman's gruff voice growled, cutting through the tense air between the two pale men. "Enough. I won't have your blood on my doorstep." He strode quickly back around the side of the small house, placing himself between them. He glared darkly at the both of them, but his eyes lingered on Seiji for a long moment before he turned back to the one-eyed man.  
  
"I am aware of the grudge between the two of you," He said, his tone a clear warning. "But you are a guest in my house, and I will not stand for any damage to my property. You're overly fond of reminding me how civilized your people are, Rajura. So you can sit down and talk it out with the boy." He didn't iquite/i smirk, but there was a definite glint of satisfaction in his eyes at the withering look Rajura shot at him.  
  
"Anubisu..." The pale man began, the corner of his one eye twitching slightly as he clenched his jaw tightly.  
  
You three, Their unexpected host whirled on Shu, Shin, and Touma. "There's a pump around back. Get yourselves cleaned up. If you wish to eat, you can cook your own meal. You'll find everything you need in the kitchen." With that, Anubisu shouldered his way past Rajura and disappeared within the house. The five men remaining in the yard passed a surprised glance around, not entirely sure what had just happened.  
  
So the three of them had found themselves trapped in the kitchen while Seiji and Rajura glowered at each other from opposite sides of the small sitting room. Or rather, Seiji glowered. Rajura's composure seemed unshakable. They hadn't exchanged so much as a single word in the forty five or so minutes they'd been out there.  
  
  
  
"It's too quiet," Shu grumbled as he chopped carrots up into uneven hunks. "This whole situation is fishy. I don't like it."  
  
"So you've said," Touma snapped, aggravated, "And said...and said...and said..."  
  
  
  
Shin snatched the knife from Shu's hand before it ended up somewhere Touma wouldn't like. He put it to better use skinning the chicken. There really wasn't enough room in the entire house for three people, let alone the kitchen. There were only three real rooms; the sitting room, the kitchen, and a smallish bedroom towards the back. A loft overhead could be converted into extra sleeping quarters if necessary, but it would be stuffy and hot up under the eaves at night.   
  
Shin quietly cleaned the bird under the water he pumped up from a well beneath the hill. His mind churned furiously as his hands worked; he knew nothing of what was going on. He had blindly accepted Seiji's reasons for pursuing his old teacher. It had seemed important that they find the man, if a war between Seiji and Rajura's Clans was to be prevented. But...had all of that been a lie? It had to be partly true, at least. Rajura had called himself Seiji's errant brother in-law, as well as the man who had shamed his sister. So at least the story of the runaway groom had been true.  
  
It seemed Seiji had simply neglected to mention his own relationship to Rajura.   
  
He felt vaguely betrayed, hurt to have heard it from Rajura and not Seiji himself. Shin understood the need to keep secrets from even your friends. He had known Shu for years and had only revealed his Elemental heritage when there had been no other choice. But that secret would have endangered his life if it had gotten out There was no such risk here for Seiji, so why hadn't he said anything? Weren't they friends at least?  
  
Shin frowned as the cold well water washed over his hands, numbing them. Now that he thought about it, he and Shu had been the only ones who seemed surprised when Rajura had let the secret slip. Seiji had been frantic, and Touma...  
  
Touma hadn't been shocked at all.  
  
"Touma?" Shin glanced over his shoulder at where the thief sat, peeling potatoes. The tough brown skin curled away from his paring knife in a long, lazy spiral, lowering itself slowly into a wooden bucket between his feet.  
  
  
  
"Yeah?" Touma asked warily, eyes darting towards Shu as if he feared the larger man would snap at him just for opening his mouth.  
  
"You knew, didn't you?" Shin asked, draining the water out of the chicken and down the sink attached to the pump. "About Seiji, I mean."  
  
Shu paused in scraping chunks of carrot into a pot of water, realization dawning in his eyes. He set the cutting board aside and turned to face the two of them.  
  
"Yeah," Touma said shortly, frowning as he sliced the peel too thin, cutting the spiral off only halfway up the potato.   
  
  
  
"...Well, how?" Shu asked, and Shin was startled to hear a note of anxiety creep into his voice. There was something in Shu's eyes and tone that spoke of worry, as if there were something about Touma that he feared.   
  
  
  
"He told me," Touma raised a quizzical eyebrow at Shu, "How the hell else would I know?"  
  
"...Right. Of course," Shu said. Shin knew he wasn't imagining the relief he heard, but he let it go for the moment.   
  
  
  
"But when?" He pressed further, "And why wouldn't you tell us?"  
  
  
  
Touma sighed and set his work aside for the moment, accepting that Shin wasn't about to let the subject drop. He studied his smudged hands for a moment before answering.  
  
"Do you remember the day before we took on the Serpent? We were on the boat we stole, and Seiji had been giving you lessons with your magic," He looked up and spoke directly to Shin, who nodded. He did remember. That was the day they had first learned anything about Seiji's purpose in Taidem. "We got him talking about his family, and the whole wedding fiasco. I guess I got a little nosey," Touma paused, gaze sliding sideways to Shu as if expecting a scoff or a snide comment. When none came, he continued. "He stormed off into the cabin and I followed to make amends. Well, we got to talking...and the next thing you know, he's spilling the whole story."  
  
"You two were down there an awfully long time," Shu nodded. "'Til sunset, when we came up to the village and nearly got lynched for stealing that boat."  
  
  
  
Touma grinned a little, picked up a new potato, and set about parting it from its skin. His grin faded as he continued to speak.  
  
"The more Seiji talked, the more upset he got," the thief went on. "I guess it was bad enough that his father arranged a marriage between his sister and lover, and they had to end their little affair. But when Blinkie out there disappeared, he got really pissed off. Not only had he violated a sacred oath and betrayed his Clan, but he went and put Seiji's sister on the spot. I got the impression that he wasn't real happy about being left behind, either."  
  
"Wouldn't it have created an even bigger problem if they'd both vanished?" Shu asked.  
  
"Well no, 'cause then both Clans would have been disgraced, and one couldn't blame the other for anything. No impending war, see? They could even arrange another marriage for the sister that way. The only ones to suffer would have been Seiji and Rajura," Touma gestured wildly with knife and potato.   
  
"Those families have some terminally skewed logic," Shu shook his head.  
  
"Better not let Seiji hear you say that," Touma advised.   
  
"But...what I still don't understand is why Seiji felt he had to keep it from us," Shin sighed as he sliced chunks of chicken off the carcass. The knife he wielded clicked rhythmically against the cutting board as he diced the meat into bite-sized cubes to be tossed into the cook-pot.  
  
"C'mon Shin," Touma snorted, jabbing the paring knife at him. "Think about it The four of us were going to be spending a lot of time cooped up on that little skiff, living and working and sleeping within a few feet of each other. It would have been a slight bit awkward if he'd told us the whole story. He also took you on as a student, creating that weird little Magi-bond thingamajig. How could he be sure you wouldn't panic if you found out just how far that bond went when he was on the student end of things?" Touma coughed awkwardly and turned a potato over in his hands. "I mean...I don't know your personal preferences, but if you swing the way most men do, that would have to be unnerving."  
  
Shin fixed his eyes on the hunk of raw meat, concentrating fiercely on the blade of the knife as sliced ever closer to his fingers. He could feel Shu's eyes on him, and knew that Touma was still studiously averting his own gaze. Still, he took his time in replying.  
  
"I can understand it," He said at last. "At least, when you put it that way. But...it still doesn't seem right that he let us come along, knowingly keeping us ignorant of the true situation "  
  
"Fair enough," Touma acknowledged. "And I'm sure he'll be only too happy to apologize for deceiving you two. After he gets a chance at Rajura's throat."  
  
"That's the part I still don't understand," Shu commented as he took the peeled potatoes and carved them up into random chunks. "How the hell does he think he's going to drag this guy halfway back around the world? Especially now We've got no supplies, no means of transportation, and not the slightest idea of where we are. It seems like a lost cause, to me."  
  
  
  
~  
  
"Tell me, Seiji," Rajura drawled, at last breaking the tense silence, "Just how do you expect to coerce me into returning to the Clans? There's nothing in it for me, other than a loveless marriage and the thinly veiled disapproval of my peers? For that matter, how does my return benefit you? I suspect that the news of our liaison has become common knowledge by now."  
  
Seiji sat stiffly across a low table from Rajura, his legs folded beneath him and his hands clenched tightly in his lap. Only by keeping them twisted up in the hem of his tunic did he control the urge to lunge across the table and choke the life out of Rajura. He had nothing to say; the sheer anger incited by the other man's presence burned away any argument he might have made. All his conscious power had been redirected to prevent a murderous rampage.  
  
"Or did you ever really intend to bring me back at all?" Rajura's voice took on an insinuating tone. He sat crosslegged, his right elbow propped up on his right knee. He leaned his cheek into his hand in a bored manner, his sole remaining eye sweeping over the young blonde in an expression of detached interest. "Did you perhaps harbor some hope of rejoining me wherever I had fled?"  
  
Seiji barely had time to bristle in absolute rage at the suggestion before Rajura reached out to him, his left hand darting forward to catch the blonde's chin in a tight grip between thumb and forefinger. The unexpected action threw Seiji off, tilting him over the line of anger and into hopeless confusion. Rajura chuckled and leaned forward, drawing Seiji towards him as he smiled darkly.  
  
"Poor little pupil," He purred, his voice low and silky in his throat. "Lost without guidance, were you?"  
  
Something inside of Seiji's head snapped with such force that he saw nothing but blinding white for a few seconds. During that brief span of time, he knocked Rajura's hand away and lunged up and forward, fisting both hands into the front of the older man's shirt. Rajura had no time to realize that he was no longer in a position of control before Seiji yanked him up to snarl into his face.  
  
"You. Do. Not. Fucking. Touch. Me." The Magi's eyes had gone flat and cold; his pupils shrank to pinpricks and the violet bled away, leaving only icy gray behind. His face was twisted into a mask of fury, teeth bared in an animalistic display of rage. "You godsbedammed bastard! You have never, not once in your miserable life, given a thought to anyone but yourself! You are a shallow, selfish, pitiful excuse for a human being, and your disregard for others has gone too far this time! If you had only left ME, I could have forgiven your actions. But no, you have put both our clans at the brink of war, you arrogant piece of shit! Hundreds, thousands of people may die in a blood-feud because you haven't got the guts to own up to your responsibilities!"   
  
Seiji punctuated his tirade with violent shakes, rattling Rajura like a ragdoll. The one-eyed-man had been completely blind-sided by this uncharacteristic display of fury from his ex-student. Never before had Seiji been pushed to the point of utterly losing his control.   
  
"That's quite enough," Anubisu's gravely voice interjected before Seiji could go on. He had entered, unnoticed, from the back bedroom, obviously alerted by the shouting. With contemptuous ease, he tore the blonde away from Rajura and tossed him back to the floor. Seiji hit the floor with a crunch and a grunt, and lay there in a sort of daze. His sudden venting had left him drained and hollow, after so many months of bottling it up inside.   
  
"I thought I made it clear that this was to be a civil exchange?" Anubisu rumbled, turning an accusatory stare onto Rajura. The pale man busied himself with straightening his shirt, tugging it back into place. Seiji sat up and glared furiously at him, but stayed where he had been thrown. Anubisu crossed his scarred and tanned arms across his chest and glowered at the both of them.  
  
"I expect to hear some sort of solution out of one of you within the next thirty seconds, or I'm tossing you both out. For good." This last comment was apparently directed to Rajura, who scowled at the woodsman. Anubisu locked eyes with him, one dark brow raising expectantly.  
  
"Well?"  
  
Rajura looked away, speaking in an indignant and injured tone. "I do have a suggestion, but suppose he attempts to choke me again..."  
  
"Quit your sniveling, Rajura. You're no child." Anubisu chided him, still standing with his arms crossed. Seiji glanced back and forth between them, mildly bemused and surprised that his old teacher actually seemed cowed by this man. There was some aspect of control, of dominance, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. It was obvious that Rajura had been living here for quite some time, so he supposed that sharing such small space might have-  
  
Oh.   
  
Seiji glanced back over his shoulder at the entrance to the single bedroom. Well, that certainly did explain a lot of things. Not that it was strange, or even entirely unexpected...no, the surprising part was that he actually felt a faint twinge of hurt at the notion.   
  
He shook it off and forced his attention back to the matter at hand. No doubt Rajura would offer a comprimise that would benefit only himself. Seiji refused to let this happen.  
  
"I propose a Magi-duel," Rajura said, a hint of his usual smug manner returning. "I'm sure you still remember the protocol involved?"  
  
Seiji found himself nodding, much as he used to do when he was still a student. He put a stop to that immediately. "Of course I remember. The duel was a method of arbitration devised back in the old days, when Magi were far more numerous. If a dispute could not be settled by conventional means, then it would be solved by the duel."  
  
Rajura nodded. "Back then, the duels were to the death. But of course, we are far more civilized today." He spoke mockingly, smiling at the flat glare Seiji shot at him. "Naturally I would not demand such a thing. That would be barbaric."  
  
"So what are your terms..?" Seiji ventured to ask.   
  
Rajura shrugged. "If I lose, I will return to the West with you, no strings attached. But, if I win...you will leave me in peace. For ever. No one is to ever search for me again."  
  
Seiji absorbed this and sat in silence for a long while. It was a risky deal; he stood to gain everything and lose so much more. Even though he was confident in his grasp of battle magic, there was a tremendous amount of pressure on him to win. If he lost, his homeland would be plunged into a long and bloody feud. His sister would be forever disgraced, and he himself would return home in failure, no longer considered a man in the eyes of society. This quest had been his one chance to redeem himself, and now he was being asked to risk it all in a single toss of the dice.  
  
However, he could think of no other way to coerce Rajura into coming home peacefully. He stood no chance of hauling a captive across an unknown wilderness, and Rajura had come to this place from their homeland, so he undoubtedly knew the way.  
  
Therefore...the only option open to him was to win.  
  
"I accept your proposition," He said at last, raising his chin to meet Rajura's eye. "Name your field of battle."  
  
Rajura chuckled darkly, his eye glinting from beneath the strap of his eyepatch. Seiji frowned, his stomach clenching anxiously. What could the pale man be so amused by...what did he have up his sleeve?   
  
"You misunderstand me, my errant pupil," He laughed. "I was not challenging you, though I thank you for accepting on the other's behalf."  
  
Seiji frowned, bewildered. "What do you mean, you weren't challenging me? Who else has anything to do with this? "  
  
"Why, him, of course," Rajura grinned widely and jabbed a finger towards the kitchen door. Shu, Shin, and Touma had packed themselves into the narrow opening. They had probably been alerted by the earlier shouting, and had been watching the drama for some time. "Your student."  
  
Shin recoiled from Rajura's confident grin, Seiji's horror-struck gape, and Anubisu's thoughtful frown, bumping into Shu, who was also gawking at him.  
  
"Who? ME? "  
  
~  
  
AN: *as promised, Lily dies of shock*  
  
Muses:...oh hell no, you're not getting out of this so easily...*somebody whips out a Pheonix Down and does the lil resurrection mojo*   
  
*jerks back to life with a gasp * O.o I am...shocked and amazed and incredibly touched. Not only did I not lose any of my established readers, but chapter 9 had more reviews than any of the others. I...wow...*boggle *  
  
So this one's done ^^ I'm hoping to get into turning out a chapter every two months or so. See, I started college, and...well it's so different Fun, though. I rather like this last chapter. It's fun to poke at Seiji, even if he is incredibly scary when he wants to be...Angel, may I borrow your chibi-Seiji muse? I think I need to counteract the scary.   
  
^-^ That said, enjoy the most recent plot twist. I have homework   
  
(Side note: I'd like to apologize to all those who were unfortunate enough to read this before I fixed all the formatting glitches (and for all the glitches that slipped past me). You see, I don't have Word on this new computer, and so I typed up the chapter in Word Perfect...which skewed up the formatting somehow. I am quite annoyed with it. We will be having words, WP and I...so I apologize on behalf of it. And now I will go smite it for making me look like an idiot newbie who doesn't know enough to make a new paragraph break every time a different person speaks -.-; Aieeyaaa...) 


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